


step into the daylight

by jemmasimmmons



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Happily Ever After, family fic, i can't believe alya doesn't have a character tag yet, just.....lots of soft things, mostly plotless and pointless, team appearances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:15:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26379418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jemmasimmmons/pseuds/jemmasimmmons
Summary: "In the deepest depths of outer space, there is no turn of the season. The stars are the same, no matter what month is showing on an arbitrary human calendar. Time, as Jemma knows all too well, is relative."It’s a whole new life. Fitz and Jemma learn how to live it, one season at a time. Set after the show’s final scene.
Relationships: Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons
Comments: 70
Kudos: 123





	1. autumn

**Author's Note:**

> i started to write something short after the finale and forgot to stop. so this is part one of four, with a short epilogue! it's basically a love letter to all my headcanons for the fitzsimmons family life after the show ends, as well as those of my friends' that i've adopted too. a special thanks to laura and eva for the language help!
> 
> i'll post the rest of the chapters every other day and i'd love to hear your thoughts! there's a spotify playlist to go with this fic, which you can find [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4h1wnHTzKLedNAN2Ev6XNk). i hope you enjoy this! 💕

_“Love’s time’s beggar, but even a single hour, bright as a dropped coin, makes love rich.”_

**‘Hour’, Carol Ann Duffy**

Over the past year, Jemma has thought a lot about what it means to have a home.

At first, she had been able to focus on nothing more than the way she felt when Fitz was beside her and Alya was in her arms, all of them back where they were supposed to be. _Home_ , she’d think, every time she reached out and found them both only an arms-length from her. They calmed her racing heart, settling an agitation she hadn’t even known she’d been feeling.

Later though, thinking about a home had meant thinking about something rather more physical. Bricks and mortar, a key in a lock. She and Fitz had braved the Scottish housing market together, seeing crumbling cottages and shiny newbuilds alike. When they had signed their names on the dotted line, Jemma had felt a giant weight lift from her shoulders. Their new house was as solid as its stone foundations, as firmly rooted as the gnarled old apple tree in the garden. It was the kind of place that had felt like home from the moment they opened the door.

But as she slips her and Fitz’s virtual communication discs back into their case, their annual catch-up with their old team over, Jemma experiences a strange bittersweet feeling. She frowns as she tries to identify it. Slowly, she realises that it is a homesickness, for a home that has changed shape and now spans the globe, even the galaxy, in a way it never did before. Swallowing hard, Jemma closes her eyes and tips her face towards the sun, allowing memories both good and bad to wash over her as she waits for the feeling to pass.

The sound of laughter pulls her back to the present and she opens her eyes again, just in time to see Alya barrelling towards her. Jemma lifts up her arms to catch her daughter, the force of her hot little body almost toppling her backwards.

‘Home!’ Alya says breathlessly, twisting in her lap. ‘Mama’s home!’

It takes Jemma a moment to realise what she means. In the game she is playing with her father, Alya has decided that she is the base, the port in the storm. She is the safe place, where grasping hands can’t reach her.

Trudging up the slope behind her, Fitz is breathing heavily. There is a grin on his face that warms Jemma far more than the weak September sun ever could. With a deep groan, he collapses beside them on the rug.

‘You’ve got that right, baby girl,’ he mumbles, bringing one hand up to rest it on Jemma’s leg.

Wrapping her arms tightly around Alya’s middle, Jemma can feel her tiny heart beating, precious as butterfly wings. She smiles and presses her lips to her daughter’s hair.

Maybe having a home meant nothing more than this.

Alya has a boiled egg and soldiers for her tea, the toast cut into perfectly straight strips and with the crusts cut off. She is becoming dangerously picky, but since she spent her first three years eating only the blandest of space rations, Jemma doesn’t yet have the heart to chide her. There will be plenty of time for crusts when she is older.

She cracks four more eggs into a glass bowl, using only one hand, and whisks until fluffy. It gives her pleasure to be an expert in the mundane, the way she’d once been an expert in the extraordinary. She is just reaching for the garlic crusher when she feels a pair of warm arms wind themselves about her waist and a chin rest against her shoulder. The arms are so familiar and the heart they belong to even more so that she doesn’t even flinch, just smiles happily and relaxes into the hug.

‘What?’ Fitz asks. ‘No dippy egg and soldiers for us?’ He sounds vaguely disappointed.

Jemma snorts. ‘You’re welcome to make yourself some soldiers,’ she says, scrapping the garlic into the egg mixture. ‘But I thought omelettes might be a more grown-up dinner.’

‘Hmm.’ Fitz brushes her hair back and kisses her neck. His lips are hot, his stubble bristling against her skin. ‘Spoilsport.’

He punctuates each syllable of the word with another kiss, making Jemma’s insides do summersaults. Her smile widens.

Letting go of the whisk, she leans back against him, threading her fingers through his own. Fitz stays quiet, swaying gently the way he used to when they needed to rock Alya to sleep. It feels steadying, like a port in the storm. Jemma squeezes his fingers.

‘The team seemed to be well, don’t you think?’ she asks.

‘Yeah.’ She can feel Fitz nodding. ‘Happy, too. I’d say safe as well, but seeing as Daisy is in outer space and Yoyo was about to zip through hostile ground…’

Jemma hums in agreement. ‘They’ll be fine, though,’ she says after a moment. ‘I trust them.’

Fitz nods again. ‘Me too.’

The bittersweet sadness pulls at Jemma’s heartstrings once more as she thinks about the team they’d once been a part off. They are all happy and safe, but they are scattered.

The warmth of Fitz’s body pressed against her own makes her brave enough to tell him: ‘I miss them.’

With a sigh, Fitz kisses her shoulder. ‘I know,’ he says simply.

Somehow, this loosens the tugging on her heart. Jemma breathes out, holding onto him until her homesickness has ebbed away. Then, she bumps her head lightly against Fitz’s own.

‘Plates, please.’

Fitz lets her go, his fingers lingering on her waist just long enough to make her tingle, and goes to collect the cutlery while she pours the omelette mixture into the saucepan. Soon, the small kitchen is filled with the comforting smell of rosemary and garlic and the sound of Fitz and Alya’s voices, singing nursery rhymes together. Jemma joins in as she slides the omelette onto the table. She imagines their songs as a flock of sparrows, soaring up and over the rooftops into the sky where they belong.

♥

‘Are you alright in there, sweet pea?’

Jemma is hovering outside Alya’s bedroom, trying to stop herself from pacing up and down.

‘Sweet peas are flowers,’ comes her daughter’s voice through the door. ‘They come from seeds and when you plant them in the ground they can be pink or purple or blue. I’m not a flower. I’m a little girl.’

Behind her, Jemma hears Fitz smack his forehead with the palm of his hand. She bites the inside of her cheek so that she doesn’t laugh.

‘Quite right, darling,’ she says, ‘you’re quite right.’

Her urge to laugh is quickly replaced by an overwhelming desire to cry once Alya opens the door. They had all driven to the nearest town together to buy her uniform, a detailed list from the school held in Jemma’s hand. The crisp white polo tops and pleated pinafore were so different to Alya’s home clothes and she’d held them with a curious reverence as she’d carried them to the cash desk. Seeing her dressed in them now, peering down to inspect her shiny patent shoes, makes tears spring to Jemma’s eyes.

‘Oh, Alya,’ she whispers, ‘you look so grown up.’

Alya wrinkles her nose and holds out her arms. ‘My cardigan is too long.’

‘That’s okay,’ Fitz says softly. He steps forward and kneels in front of her. ‘We can fix that.’

Taking one of Alya’s arms at a time, he carefully folds back the sleeves of her cardigan so that they aren’t covering her hands. Jemma can see the emotion in his face as he smiles at her, tucking a loose strand of blonde hair back behind her ear. She knows that if they aren’t careful, Alya will be arriving at school with her brand new uniform already tear-stained.

Taking a deep breath, she holds up her phone.

‘Right then!’ she says, as brightly as she can. ‘Pictures!’

They take as many as her camera roll can hold. Ones of Alya on her own, standing on the doorstep, posing in the garden. Ones of her and Fitz, beaming up at each other with matching grins. Then Fitz takes the phone and Jemma lifts her daughter into her arms for her turn. Alya wraps her arms around her neck and Jemma finds herself fighting back tears again. Fitz even sets up a self-timer and, balancing the phone on the windowsill, dashes back to stand beside them before the picture is taken. It comes out a little bit blurred, him still in motion, Jemma and Alya turning their faces to laugh at him. It is perfect.

They are about to climb into the car when Alya cries out, ‘wait!’

Fitz and Jemma turn around to look at her in surprise, and Jemma feels her heart leap into her mouth. She’s changed her mind, she thinks, she doesn’t want to go to school after all. A thousand platitudes spring to her lips, ready to sooth her daughter’s fears and remind her how much _fun_ it will be, how much more she will learn. Her fingers itch to wipe away the tears that are going to fall.

But Alya isn’t crying. She bounds up to her parents, beaming, and grasps their hands.

‘You need a picture, too,’ she explains, pulling them away from the car and back into the garden. ‘They can’t _all_ be of me. That isn’t fair.’

For a moment, Jemma is speechless. Then Fitz lets out a burst of relieved laughter and drops to one knee. He takes Alya’s head in his hands and kisses her on the forehead.

‘You’re absolutely right, monkey,’ he says, then pokes her in the stomach, making her squeal. ‘One more picture, then!’

Jemma hands Alya her phone and she and Fitz pose on the front doorstep, their arms around each other. She almost forgets to smile when Alya takes the photo, too distracted by the adorable way her daughter squints as she positions the camera. She closes one eye, exactly the same way Fitz does.

It is only later, once they have seen Alya safely through the school gates and waved to her until she disappears from view, once they have climbed back in the car to drive home with an empty car seat in the rear view mirror, that Jemma remembers to look at the picture. Clearly, her squinting hadn’t helped Alya take her shot – most of the photo is of the garden path and the green of the grass. She and Fitz only appear from the chest down, their wedding rings catching the sunlight as their arms circle each other’s waists.

Safe in the passenger seat, Fitz’s hand in hers and their daughter at her first day of school, Jemma lets out a little laugh and allows her tears to fall.

They’d put off Alya going to school for as long as they possibly could, making lame excuses to one another as one month dragged onto the next.

‘We’re both at home anyway,’ Fitz would say, sprawling on the floor as he helped Alya construct a Lego tower, ‘paying for nursery classes would be fiscally irresponsible.’

Jemma would nod at his logic. ‘And she’s wonderfully socialised,’ she would add, accepting whatever leaf, flower or smooth stone Alya had deemed a precious treasure and was holding out for her to take. ‘Her language skills and shape and number recall are really quite advanced for her age.’

Eventually though, they’d run out of reasons to keep her at home. And so a pretty little primary school in the nearest village, converted from an old stone church, had been chosen and Alya had been enrolled to start in the autumn term. She and Fitz had carefully schooled her in what to say – please can I play with you, my favourite book is The Very Hungry Caterpillar, I’m allergic to peanuts – and more importantly, what not to say – I lived in _space_. Alya chants these responses obediently, but they are both convinced that she takes very little notice of them. Alya will say what she wants to say, whenever she wants to say it. It’s just one of the infinite reasons why they love her as much as they do.

That first day is a restless one for Jemma. For the last year, her daily routine has revolved around Alya. Her days have been filled with stories, the ones acted out in fifteen minute episodes on children’s television, the ones she read in picture books, and the ones she told Alya out of her own head. Alya’s favourites were the star stories, tales woven together from the constellations that had passed by the Zephyr windows. Fitz and Jemma had told her the traditional stories too but Alya liked it best when they made up their own. Inevitably, parts of their own adventures became woven into those of the heroes of myth. Soon, Jemma had known these new tales better than she could remember the originals.

Now though, she feels rudderless, cast adrift without these continuous daily stories. She can’t focus on anything for more than five minutes at a time, her thoughts always wandering out of the window and towards the school gates.

When Fitz comes in through the front door, his arms weighed down with grocery bags, he almost trips over the vacuum she’s left in the hall.

‘Bloody hell-’

There is a muffled thump and then a rolling sound, which might be a melon making a break for freedom across the hardwood floors.

‘Jemma!’

‘Oh!’ Jemma hurries out of the playroom, catching up the runaway melon up as she goes. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’ With her foot, she pushes the vacuum out of the way, clearing a path for Fitz to carry the bags through into the kitchen. ‘I started to hoover out there, but then I came in here and noticed how dirty the windows were so I decided to clean them instead.’

‘Which you didn’t finish either, I take it,’ Fitz says dryly, setting the groceries down next to the window cleaner and cloth.

‘Well, then I thought about the crayons Alya left in the playroom yesterday and I didn’t want her to slip on them when she comes home!’

‘Yes, because it sure would be terrible if someone took a fall in this house today.’

Fitz raises his eyebrows at her meaningfully and Jemma groans.

‘I know, and I’m sorry!’ She steps forward and takes his hands, turning them over in her own. ‘I don’t know what’s _wrong_ with me this morning…’

‘If I had to hazard a guess,’ Fitz says, ‘I would say it’s the same thing that kept me at the supermarket for half an hour longer than usual.’ He squeezes her fingers. ‘I missed my little helper.’

Jemma gives a soft huff of laughter, even as tears prick her eyes. Fitz pulls her closer and she wraps her arms around his waist, burying her head into his shoulder. The familiar smell of his jumper, part fabric softener and part something all his own, makes her nose tickle as she breathes it in.

‘This is the longest you’ve been apart from her since…you know, your trip to the past,’ Fitz murmurs. ‘It’s only natural that you’d be reminded of that, reminded of how much that hurt for you.’ On her back Jemma can feel him rubbing soothing circles, as if he could smooth away everything that troubled her. ‘It’s okay to be nervous. It’s okay to miss her.’

Jemma nods, broodily. She doesn’t think about those few weeks she’d spent travelling through time, travelling further and further away from them, much anymore. It was all beginning to feel very far away, something that had happened to another version of herself, before this morning came around and she had to say goodbye again.

Suddenly, a new thought occurs to her. With a gasp, she twists her head up to look at Fitz. ‘But this is the longest you’ve _ever_ been apart from her.’

‘Yeah.’ His eyes are glistening and she feels his throat bob as he nods back at her. ‘She’s just been everything for so long, you know? It’s _hard_.’

‘Yes,’ Jemma whispers. She kisses his jawline, the only part of him that she can reach in her socks. ‘It is.’

For a moment, neither of them move. Jemma can hear the kitchen clock tick on but she has no mind to leave the warm comfort of her husband’s arms. Not when he is holding her this way, making her feel so safe and loved. Home. The word springs unprompted to Jemma’s mind, bright sunlight on water.

She tips her face up. ‘Do you remember your first day at school?’

‘Uh, yeah.’ Fitz winces. ‘I hid behind an oak tree in the playground all morning.’

‘Leopold Fitz, you did _not_!’

‘I know, it was terrible of me, really. They were on the verge of calling the police when Mum came by with the sandwiches she’d forgotten to pack in my lunch. I trotted out from behind my tree the moment I heard her voice.’ He is grinning now, lost in the memory. ‘What about you?’

‘Oh, I loved it. I tried out all the activities – the sandpit, the gardening patch, the doll’s house, and the reading corner. At eleven o’clock, I told my teacher that I’d done everything and could I please go home now. The poor woman had to tell me that home time wasn’t until three in the afternoon.’

‘And?’

‘I sat down in the middle of the carpet and cried and cried. I don’t think I stopped until Dad came for me at the end of the day.’

Biting her lip, Jemma sneaks a glance at Fitz. As soon as they meet each other’s gaze, they dissolve into laughter, the vibrations of it passing back and forth along their still joined hands.

‘Oh-hh,’ Jemma moans, her shoulders still shaking with laughter as she drops her head forward onto Fitz’s chest. ‘She’s going to have hated it, isn’t she?’ she asks, her voice muffled.

Taking her gently by the arms, Fitz lifts her up again. ‘No,’ he says firmly. ‘She’s better than both of us, in a million different ways. She’s going to have _loved_ it.’ He kisses her on the lips. ‘Trust me.’

And, maybe because the way he kisses her makes her want to sigh like a lovestruck teenager, Jemma does.

When Alya comes home from school, she asks how soon it will be before she can go again.

♥

In the deepest depths of outer space, there is no turn of the season. The stars are the same, no matter what month is showing on an arbitrary human calendar. Time, as Jemma knows all too well, is relative.

She hadn’t much missed the different seasons while she’d lived in Theta Serpentis, especially autumn. Those months were too damp for her liking, too full of decay. Why would she miss them? She was living amongst her first love, one that had lent its name to her latest. The passing of the stars outside the Zephyr’s windows was far more magnificent to Jemma than any pile of rotting leaves could ever be.

But to Alya, everything on earth is new, including the change of the seasons. Through her daughter’s eyes, Jemma finds herself rediscovering the wonder of the changing colour of the leaves, of the crisp blue frost crunching underfoot, even of the cloud of breath that comes out visible in the thin dawn light.

‘We’re dragons,’ she whispers to Alya, and the two of them breathe cold fire as they run down the country lanes at the back of the cottage.

Alya jumps into the piles of burnt-red leaves Fitz has raked together and emerges squealing, shaking dead foliage out of her hair. Jemma watches her and marvels at how she can make the mundane seem so beautiful.

Thanks to Alya, she even starts to see the wonder in the holidays of the season again. When Alya comes home from school, staggering under the weight of a carved pumpkin, Jemma sets a lit candle into its hollow and they all troop outside to watch it flicker in the dark. They go trick-or-treating, Alya dressed in a black leotard and fluffy tail. She refuses to say anything but ‘miaow’ all evening and they eat the sweet treats she collects from their neighbours until all three of them feel sick.

It is such fun that Jemma begins to look forward to Guy Fawkes Night in earnest. She and Fitz spend all afternoon dragging old planks of wood and tree branches down to the bottom of the garden and buy fizzing sparklers to dance in the night air. She is so absorbed in wrapping baked potatoes in foil to cook in the bonfire, that she doesn’t hear Alya’s question the first time around.

Jemma blinks. ‘Sorry, sweet girl. What was that?’

Alya gives an exasperated sigh. ‘The _party_ , Mama. Can I go?’

_Party_? Jemma opens her mouth, then closes it again. She can’t remember anything about a party. Glancing over Alya’s head, she looks to Fitz for help.

‘Freddie’s mum asked us on our way back from the park,’ he explains. ‘It’s a firework party, right, Alya?’

‘Yes, yes, yes!’ Alya bounces up and down, making her hair jump on her shoulders. ‘And there will be sparklers and rockets and chocolate brownies!’ she recites, dancing in circles about the kitchen.

Fitz moves further forward. Jemma can feel him eyeing her carefully as she sets down the potato, her finger shaking.

‘Shelagh seemed perfectly nice,’ he says, ‘and she and Freddie’s dad will be there the whole time. She promised me. She also said to tell you that the kids won’t be allowed anywhere near where the fireworks are being set off.’

Jemma nods, pleased to hear this at least, but it does nothing to stem the bitter disappointment she can feel in her throat. Her imaginings of the perfect evening, all of them wrapped in scarves and laughing as they held their potatoes into the fire, ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the fireworks lighting up the sky above them, start to fade away like mist on the hills. She misses the memories that will never be made.

‘Jemma,’ Fitz says softly. When she looks up at him, she finds him regarding her carefully. He understands, she knows he does – it is written all over his face. But he understands something far more important too. ‘It’s her first party.’

His eyes flick upwards, and Jemma follows his gaze to look at Alya, still spinning on her tiptoes and giggling with delight as she becomes hopelessly dizzy.

Jemma’s heart melts in an instant. What were the memories she will miss compared to the ones her daughter will make? She takes a deep breath.

‘You’re quite right,’ she says as brightly as she can, giving Fitz a slight nod to show that she knows what he means. ‘Quite right, indeed.’

Stepping away from the kitchen island, she darts out an arm to grasp Alya by the waist and catch her up. Her daughter shrieks with laughter as she presses a loud raspberry to her cheek. The softness of her skin, smelling of apple juice and crisp autumn air, lifts Jemma’s spirits enough to let her smile.

‘And a first party requires an extra special outfit, don’t you think so, darling? Now, let’s go see what we can find…’

It is the perfect evening for a fireworks party. Every parent Fitz and Jemma encounter on the path leading up to Freddie’s front door feels the need to remark upon this, and they are still cheerfully reflecting on it three hours later when they arrive to take Alya home again.

‘Windy enough to get the bonfire going,’ one father tells Jemma as she passes her a plastic cup of hot Ribena, ‘but not enough to blow the smoke into their wee faces!’

‘And wonderfully clear,’ Shelagh adds, throwing her a welcoming smile, ‘perfect for watching the fireworks! I haven’t known a Guy Fawkes Night be so ideal for _years_.’

Jemma smiles back, warming her fingers on the hot cup. She has a sudden thought that these are people with whom she will likely be spending a lot of time with over the coming years, as their children navigate primary school together. Probably, she and Fitz will even end up becoming friends with some of them. She looks from one face to another and sees the open friendship and love for their children shining out of them. These are people who have never held a gun, met an alien, or travelled through time. They are ordinary, in the most extraordinary way, and Jemma decides that she will be perfectly happy to consider them friends and be thought of in return.

When Shelagh offers her a pink marshmallow on a stick, she accepts.

In spite of praise for the evening’s wind speeds, Alya still manages to end up stinking of woodsmoke, evident to her parents from the moment she sets foot in the car. Fitz pulls a face as he drives them away and Jemma gives a resigned sigh. As soon as they arrive home, she whisks her daughter up the stairs for a bath.

She strips Alya of her pink t-shirt and sparkly jeans – which was, she is assured, the perfect party outfit – and dunks her into the bathtub. She soaps Alya’s feathery blonde hair and together they build a mountain of bubbles on her belly, which they take turns to blow off. They may not be the kind of memories Jemma had expected to make tonight, but, as Alya’s laughter fills the steamy bathroom, they are no less precious.

Towelled dry and smelling sweetly smoke-free, Alya skips past Jemma to go down to the living room. By the time Jemma joins her, having emptied the bath and bundled the offending clothes into the washing machine to deal with in the morning, she has curled herself up onto Fitz’s lap, her head resting just beneath his chin.

With a smile, Jemma sinks onto the sofa beside them. When Fitz reaches out a hand, she slides her own fingers between his, enjoying the jump of his pulse against her skin.

She turns her head slightly to watch him with Alya. He is gently rubbing his chin back and forth on the top of her head, his stubble creating static in her hair. She holds his free hand in her lap, slowly turning his fingers over, one by one. The sight of their profiles together, the curves of their noses and cheeks so similar, never fails to render Jemma breathless. Even after four full years of wonder, it still amazes her that she is able to see so much of the man she loves in this small person. Alya binds them to each other, even tighter than their wedding vows had. Every beat of her heart is proof of their love.

‘How was the party, monkey?’ Fitz asks her, bouncing her on his knee.

Alya’s eyes are fixed on the television screen – One Hundred and One Dalmatians is playing, an old favourite from their days on the Zephyr. It had been one of the only films Enoch had been able to find for them, so Alya had ended up watching it a lot, sometimes every day for days on end. She knows it so well she can recite it backwards, and Jemma catches her mouthing along to the dialogue before she pauses to answer.

‘Good.’

‘What was the best bit, then?’

‘Marshmallows,’ Alya says. Jemma grins, and rolls her eyes. She might have been able to guess that one. Upstairs, Alya’s flannel still bears the evidence that dozens of the sticky sweets had passed through her lips.

Nudging Fitz’s shoulder, she shoots him a look and nods at the television. Understanding her hint that Alya is far more interested in the animated dogs than answering his questions, Fitz nods back and they lapse into companionable silence.

Suddenly, just as the puppies are attempting their daring escape through the snow, Alya pipes up again.

‘Mama?’

‘What is it, darling?’

‘Freddie has a baby sister,’ she says, still watching the screen, though her thoughts are clearly wandering.

‘I know. I met her.’

Shelagh had begged her to take the baby for a few moments, just while she took the brownies out of the oven, and Jemma had been perfectly happy to oblige. Freddie’s sister was a bonny little thing and she’d enjoyed the weight of a baby in her arms again, although it had given her a smug pleasure to recall that Alya had been a far prettier baby at that age.

‘Pippa has a baby sister too. And Duncan has _two_ little brothers.’

Over the top of her head, Jemma shares a glance with Fitz. Where is their daughter going with this?

‘I just think,’ Alya says, ‘that I ought to have one as well.’ She turns to look at them, her face open and honest and simple. ‘Don’t you?’

There have been few times in her life that Jemma has been rendered speechless. Tonight, cornered on her sofa by her four year old, is one of them.

She is saved from having to having to form an answer to Alya’s question by Fitz, who clears his throat and stands up.

‘Right,’ he says with determination. ‘It’s late. Storytime and bedtime for you, missy.’

Alya protests, kicking feebly out at him as he carries her out of the room, but Jemma can hear her whines turn to giggles as their voices fade up the stairs. Alone in the living room, there is only one place for her thoughts to turn.

It is not as though the thought of another child hasn’t crossed her mind before. In dreamy moments, she has often found herself wondering what they might be like – whether this time they have Fitz’s blue eyes, her freckles. But before tonight they had only been abstract thoughts. Time had once been something she’d considered a luxury. Now, she seemed to have it in abundance.

She had been sure that she would know when the time was right for their second child. Alya, it seems, has decided that the right time was _now_. Jemma wonders, heart thumping, whether she is right.

It feels like a matter of moments before Fitz is back. He collapses on the sofa and looks to her with breathless anticipation.

‘Well?’ he asks.

Jemma feels her stomach swoop. There is no need for her to ask him what he means. She knows full well that while he’s been going through the motions of putting Alya to bed his mind has been occupied with the same line of thought as her own.

‘Well,’ she says, slowly, ‘we’ll have to give it some thought.’

An excitement that moments before had been bright on Fitz’s face suddenly dims.

‘Oh. Yeah.’ He bites his bottom lip, nodding in a thoughtful manner. ‘Yeah, you’re right.’

His disappointment is so obvious, so exactly what she needed to see to be sure, that Jemma almost bursts out laughing. Pursing her lips together, she shifts on the sofa, drawing herself nearer to Fitz.

‘For example…we’ve never conceived on Earth before. Not in either of our timelines. We don’t even know whether it will be possible.’

Lifting her fingers, Jemma begins to run them lightly along her husband’s arm. When he turns to look at her, she tilts her head, a silent invitation to change their lives for the better once more. Understanding dawns in Fitz’s eyes, a brilliant aurora of hope.

‘Why, Dr. Simmons,’ he says, reaching out to take her hand, ‘that sounds like a hypothesis.’

Jemma chuckles. ‘Does it?’

Fitz hums. With a gentle tug, he guides her across the sofa so that she is straddling him, one leg on either side of his lap. ‘And you know what happens with hypotheses, don’t you?’

Jemma takes his head in her hands, her fingertips brushing backwards into his hair. ‘What?’

‘They have to be proved,’ here, Fitz pauses to kiss her, his lips soft and inviting, ‘or disproved.’

Shutting her eyes, Jemma allows his kiss to send a thrill of excitement through her, a tantalising promise of what was still to come. When she opens them again, Fitz’s smile is the first thing she sees. Her heart stutters. Another child with a smile just like his. How could they have deprived the world of that for so long?

Bending forward, Jemma kisses him back and, despite knowing the curves of his lips by heart, it feels like something brand new.

‘Well, then,’ she murmurs, ‘we’d better get started.’


	2. winter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘I don’t suppose you guys have built a lab in this rural idyll of yours?’
> 
> Instead of answering him, Fitz looks to Jemma. His question goes unsaid, but she understands it even so. Biting her lip, Jemma turns back to Elena and Alya. Elena has swept her daughter up in her arms and is alternating blowing raspberries and kisses onto her face, much to Alya’s glee. She and Mack have come all this way, in the dead of night and possibly pursued by foes, to ask for their help. Retired though they may be, Jemma knows that she and Fitz aren’t about to say no.
> 
> Meeting Fitz’s eye, she gives him an almost imperceptible nod, the kind only a husband would know to interpret. Fitz holds her gaze steadily for a moment longer before turning back to Mack.
> 
> ‘We haven’t,’ he says. ‘But I guess the dining room will do.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for your lovely comments on chapter one! i hope you enjoy this one too

It comes in the dead of night, a deep metallic thrumming that pulses its way into Jemma’s dreaming. She wakes up just in time to see a thin strip of blue light shine beneath the bedroom curtains before vanishing.

Panic wraps cold fingers around her chest. She bolts upright, her heart thumping, and strains to hear any further sounds.

‘Get Alya,’ Fitz says into the dark. He is fumbling with something in his bedside drawer, and Jemma sees a glint of silver. His Icer, a new model with biometric controls. It will only fire if it is being held by him or her. ‘Stay at the top of the stairs and don’t come down until I say it’s safe.’

They move as one, pushing back the duvet and hurrying on silent feet to the door. There, they diverge – Jemma to Alya’s room and half of her heart down the stairs to confront their intruders. Jemma shudders, but she doesn’t have time to worry about that now.

Easing Alya’s bedroom door open, she peeks inside. Alya is awake, but only just, her dark eyes peeping over the top of her blankets. She gives a catlike yawn, her mouth wide, showing off the milky gap in her top row of teeth.

‘Mama?’

‘Shh, darling,’ Jemma whispers, kneeling beside her bed to hide the way she is trembling. ‘It’s alright.’ She licks her lips to wet them. ‘Everything is alright.’

Alya is still sleepy enough that she can lift her with ease, wrapping her favourite green blanket tightly around her. It is the same one they’d left her with in the containment pod, faded with time and worn thin with use, but Alya refuses to let it go. Jemma can understand that. It is a constant from her old life to her new and it brings her comfort.

With her daughter’s arms now squeezing tightly around her neck, Jemma feels braver. Pressing a determined kiss to Alya’s temple, she tiptoes back onto the landing.

Fitz has left the house; Jemma can see the shadow of the open back door leading out into the garden. She is almost tempted to take Alya down so she can look out of the kitchen window and spot him, but holds herself back. She’d promised Fitz they would stay here until he came back for them. And he would. Jemma grits her teeth. He has to.

‘Mama?’ Alya struggles upright, pushing her blanket away from her shoulders. ‘Are we being ‘shh’?’ She lifts her hand and puts one finger to her lips.

Jemma gives a soft laugh. ‘Yes, sweetie,’ she says, with only the slightest waver in her voice. ‘We’re being ‘shh’.’ She puts a finger to her own lips.

‘For how long?’

‘Oh, not long. Not long at all. Just until Daddy comes b-’

The slam of the back door makes them both jump. Instinctively, Jemma tightens her hold on Alya, moving one hand to hold it protectively on the back of her head. It feels like an age before Fitz’s voice floats up the stairs to meet them.

‘Jemma! It’s safe, you can come down.’

Jemma glances at Alya. Her daughter pulls a face and shrugs, her small palms turned upwards towards the ceiling. It is such a funny gesture that all of Jemma’s fear instantly vanishes. She chuckles, settles Alya on her hip, and descends the stairs.

Fitz is at the kitchen counter, dropping tea bags into mugs. Leaning against the back of a chair, black fingerless gloves on the table in front of him, is a very familiar face.

‘Mack!’ Jemma’s arms sag with relief. She lets Alya slide down to the floor. ‘It’s you!’

‘It’s me,’ Mack agrees with a grin. ‘It’s good to see you, Simmons.’

‘You too! Although-’

‘Although,’ Fitz grumbles, handing Mack a steaming mug, ‘it would have been nice to know in advance that you were dropping by.’

Mack frowns. ‘Hey now, Yoyo and I did text you both. We, uh, just forgot about, you know…’ He glances out the window to the pitch-black garden. ‘Time differences.’

Fitz snorts, but despite his grumpiness Jemma can tell that he is pleased to see his friend. It has been too long.

Alya has been watching them all with interest, her head going backwards and forwards like she is watching a tennis match. Now, she steps forward and plants her hands on her hips, tilting her face upwards.

‘You woke us up, Uncle Mack,’ she says disapprovingly.

Looking down at her, Mack’s face visibly softens. He crouches down so that they are face to face.

‘I know I did, little one,’ he says. ‘And I’m very sorry. Do you think you can forgive me?’

Alya seems to think about this very carefully, her forehead crinkling with the effort. Slowly, she nods.

‘Alright. But,’ she adds, ‘only if you promise not to do it again.’

Jemma can see how badly Mack wants to laugh and she feels a stab of fondness for him as he schools his face into a serious expression.

‘Well now, I think that’s a fair promise. Bump it?’

He offers her his closed fist and Alya holds up her own, giggling as he bumps them gently together. Compared to Mack’s, her fist is impossibly tiny. Watching them together, Jemma cannot help but smile. Fitz winks at her as he hands her a mug of her own.

‘You said Yoyo texted us as well,’ he says, ‘is she here too?’

‘Yeah. She took herself off to do a perimeter sweep, just in case we were followed.’ Straightening up, Mack checks his watch. ‘She should be landing in three, two…’

A sudden gust of wind blows all their hair backwards as Elena appear in the doorway.

‘One,’ Mack finishes.

Elena smirks at him and nods to Fitz and Jemma. ‘Hey, you two.’ She glances downwards and instantly brightens, her grin growing even wider. ‘Hi, _chiquita_!’

Bending down, she makes grabby hands towards Alya, who immediately leaves Mack and skips over to bask in the undivided attention of this newcomer. Jemma fights back the urge to roll her eyes. Sometimes, her daughter could be as much of a peacock as her father.

Despite her delight at seeing Mack and Elena again, she cannot help but feel a little uneasy. It is too unexpected, too out of the blue. When she looks up and sees Mack eyeing her guiltily, Jemma knows that her instincts are right.

‘Something tells me that you two aren’t just here for a cup of tea,’ she says quietly. ‘Are you?’

‘No.’ Mack sighs and shakes his head with a rueful smile. ‘We aren’t, I’m afraid, Simmons.’ He glances over at Fitz. ‘I don’t suppose you guys have built a lab in this rural idyll of yours?’

Instead of answering him, Fitz looks to Jemma. His question goes unsaid, but she understands it even so. Biting her lip, Jemma turns back to Elena and Alya. Elena has swept her daughter up in her arms and is alternating blowing raspberries and kisses onto her face, much to Alya’s glee. She and Mack have come all this way, in the dead of night and possibly pursued by foes, to ask for their help. Retired though they may be, Jemma knows that she and Fitz aren’t about to say no.

Meeting Fitz’s eye, she gives him an almost imperceptible nod, the kind only a husband would know to interpret. Fitz holds her gaze steadily for a moment longer before turning back to Mack.

‘We haven’t,’ he says. ‘But I guess the dining room will do.’

Half an hour later, Jemma glances through the dining room door. Mack and Fitz are bent over the table together, blueprints and white paper spread out around them with multicoloured scribbles and sketches drawn on them. Clearly Fitz had only been able to lay hands on Alya’s coloured crayons.

He is talking with his free hand as he draws, building a design in the air at the same time as his mind puts it down on paper. Jemma has always prided herself on her ability to see these designs, and it pleases her to see Mack nodding thoughtfully as her husband explains. He understands Fitz’s process, maybe not as well as she does, but enough to give him the confidence to go on.

Turning away to give them some privacy, Jemma continues back to the playroom, where she’d left Elena and Alya.

‘Thanks, Jemma,’ Elena says with a sigh as she passes her a fresh cup of coffee. She presses her fingers around its warmth and inhales its steam, before poking Alya with her toe. ‘What do you have for me now, _mi amor_?’

Jemma settles herself in the armchair by the wall to watch them. They are sitting on the floor beside Alya’s dollhouse, a beautiful cream and sage painted miniature of an old Georgian townhouse. Fitz had built and decorated it for her fourth birthday and even now would often produce a new piece of furniture that he’d whittled for it out of an odd block of wood or soldered together from scrap metals. Because of this, it was Alya’s favourite possession.

Now, she carefully reaches into the dollhouse’s living room and lifts out the tiny record player from the sideboard. Shuffling closer to Elena, she drops it into her waiting hand.

‘ _El tocadiscos_ ,’ Elena says, passing it back.

Alya frowns, and Jemma can practically see her practicing the syllables in her head before trying it out loud. ‘ _El tocadiscos_.’

‘Very good! And another?’

Getting to her feet, Alya stretches into the attic of the dollhouse and picks up a long black object on a tripod, a miniature version of her own telescope that stood by the playroom window

‘ _El telescopio_.’

‘ _El telescopio_ ,’ Alya repeats, nodding as she places it back in its place. ‘For looking at the stars.’

‘ _Las estrellas_ ,’ Elena says softly. She glances over at Jemma. ‘This is such a beautiful piece, Jemma.’

‘Thank you.’ Jemma smiles, always pleased to hear praise for Fitz’s work. And it was true, the dollhouse really was exquisitely done. ‘She’s a very lucky girl to have so many wonderful toys.’

This last is directed at Alya, who giggles sheepishly and drops back to the floor to fiddle with the plates of food no bigger than her thumbnail spread out on the doll-sized kitchen table. Elena grins and bends forward to bop her on the nose.

‘Oh, she is,’ she agrees. ‘And how lucky would she be if Auntie Yoyo had one more to add to her collection?’

‘Yoyo!’ Jemma groans as she sees Alya’s eyes light up. ‘Not another present! She’s still finishing that colouring book you and Mack sent her last time.’

‘I know, I know!’ Elena waves her off, unzipping her rucksack. ‘But when I saw it, I just couldn’t resist. Mack and I were going to save it for Christmas, but since we’re here now…’

Out of her bag, she pulls something large and green and fluffy. Alya gasps and reaches out to take it.

‘Mama, look! It’s a turtle!’

‘We were in the Galapagos last week,’ Elena explains. ‘We had a suspected,’ she covers Alya’s ears and mouths the word at Jemma, ‘inhuman hunter in the area. Keeping them like trophies.’ Jemma suppresses a shudder as Elena grimaces. ‘Anyway, while we were scouting the area for his trail, we came across the giftshop and this little guy was just calling my name.’

‘She has too many soft toys already,’ Jemma tries to protest, but the sweet stitched face of the turtle makes her waver. Already Alya is stroking its soft head. ‘You should see her bedroom. It’s like a menagerie!’

‘Oh, I’m sure.’ Elena takes the turtle back from Alya and makes it dance in front of her face. ‘But I bet she doesn’t have a turtleman like her Uncle Mack.’

‘It’s true, Mama,’ Alya breathes. She twists around and fixes Jemma with large beseeching eyes. ‘I don’t!’

Knowing full well that she is beaten, Jemma drops her head into her hands. But, despite her tableau of despair, she can’t stop herself from smiling through her fingers.

She and Fitz had made a pact to be sterner about their team and families spoiling Alya. The endless presents and treats and days out, they had decided, needed to stop. But secretly, Jemma knows that neither of them have the heart to enforce this too closely. Every present, every kiss, every display of affection their daughter receives is evidence that she is loved by those around her. After spending the beginning of her life so isolated from them, this love could never be something they denied her.

And so, after an appropriate amount of time has passed, Jemma lifts her head and feels her heart swell as Elena pulls Alya onto her lap and peppers kisses to the top of her head once more.

‘Fitz? Are you coming to bed?’

Mack and Elena had left long ago. Jemma has already put Alya back to bed, calming her down from her midnight excitement and tucking her up once more. Her new turtle toy took pride of place beside her, next to her stuffed monkeys. She will sleep till midmorning, Jemma knew, then wake up disoriented and hungry for her breakfast. She’d flicked off the light and headed for her own room.

Jemma had been about to crawl beneath her own covers to go back to sleep when she realised her husband wasn’t already there. So, she’d padded back down the stairs to find him.

‘Of course, of course.’ Fitz is still bent over the dining room table, his crayon flying over the page. ‘I just, ah, want to finish this off first…’

Stepping forward, Jemma peers over his shoulder to see what he is working on.

‘Daisy’s gauntlets?’

‘Yeah. My old design. Apparently they came across a new inhuman last week in-’

‘The Galapagos,’ Jemma finishes for him.

Fitz gives her a funny look. ‘How’d you know that?’

‘Because I’m brilliant.’

‘Of course you are. Anyway, this new inhuman is a hydrokinetic, can you imagine? She’s struggling to control her powers and Mack thought some modified gauntlets could help her…’

He trails off, an idea occurring to him, and grabs for the crayon again. Jemma waits until he has added another feature to the glove design in front of him then gently prods again.

‘But I thought you gave Mack a design? He certainly seemed happy enough when he left.’

‘Oh, I did.’ Fitz nods absently, twirling the crayon in his good hand. ‘But then I thought of a way to make them even better. I’ll email this design to him first thing in the morning, let his engineers get their mucky hands on it.’

He chuckles, almost to himself, and in that moment Jemma sees something shine in his eyes that she hasn’t for a very long time. Not happiness – she has seen that in abundance, every day of their new lives. Instead she sees his passion, his drive to build and create. It is such an integral part of him, of the man that she loves, that Jemma wonders why she hasn’t thought to miss it before now.

This wasn’t to say that Fitz hadn’t designed anything since they’d been living in Scotland. He’d spent a long time renovating the kitchen and bathrooms, and he’d helped Jemma with the painting and decorating. Then, he’d done it all again in miniature for Alya’s dollhouse. But all that felt like a long time ago now, and besides, Jemma knew that while it had given him more pleasure it hadn’t held the same kind of rush as building for SHIELD had. She knew because she had felt the loss of it too.

Suppressing a sigh, she moves forward. Wordlessly, Fitz moves his arm to accommodate her, allowing her to perch on his lap. He replaces his arm, but this time slips it around her waist. Jemma rests her head on top of his.

‘Do you miss it?’ she murmurs quietly.

For a moment or two, Fitz says nothing. Then, he sets the crayon down and hugs her to him.

‘Depends on what you’re asking about. Do I miss the fighting for our lives? The constant danger? The godawful packets of preserved food? No. Absolutely not.’

Jemma grins into his hair.

‘But,’ Fitz says haltingly. ‘I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss this.’ He gestures to the blueprints adorned with coloured crayon scribbles. ‘The designing. The building. The taking something from my head and seeing it brought to life. Collaborating on it with you, sharing it with you. It’s…it’s been part of my life for so long now that I think it would be weird if I didn’t miss it a bit.’

Relief floods Jemma’s stomach as she nods. She feels the exact same way.

‘Not that I’d change anything that we did,’ Fitz adds. ‘Not for the world. But sometimes lately I’ve caught myself feeling a bit…’

‘Bored?’ When he nods against her, Jemma smiles. ‘Me too. I think it’s Alya starting school. Back when we were full-time parents, we didn’t have the space in our lives for boredom.’

‘Hmm.’ Fitz considers this. ‘You might be right there.’

‘What do you suggest we do about it?’

‘Try home-schooling?’

Jemma rolls her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Fitz, we’d be the _worst_ teachers and you know it. I was thinking more along the lines of a project.’

‘Oh?’ Fitz twists his head towards her. In the dim light of the dining room near dawn, she sees a glint in his eye again. ‘What did you have in mind?’

‘Nothing specific yet,’ Jemma admits. She wishes she’d thought of something to suggest before she’d said it. ‘But I’m sure we’ll come up with something.’

Fitz nods his agreement. ‘When we put our heads together there’s nothing we can’t do.’

Jemma can feel his gratitude in the warmth of his kiss as he leans upwards, in the press of his hands around her waist. Winding her arms about his neck, she kisses him back, and when they draw apart they rest their foreheads together as though the sharing of their ideas has already begun.

♥

‘So, into the oven the cake goes. Can you tell me how long it needs to be in for?’

Kneeling on a kitchen stool, Alya pores over the recipe book. ‘There’s a number four…and a number five.’

‘Very good, my little star! Leo, be a dear and pass me the shortbread tin on the shelf.’

‘Mum, she’s already had two gingerbread people, and licked out the cake bowl,’ Fitz protests. ‘I really don’t think…’

He trails off as Andrea Fitz fixes him with a stern look and, with a sigh, turns to retrieve the tin. Despite its tartan trim and the pictures of biscuits on the front, it hasn’t held any shortbread for a long time, being filled instead with golden, buttery tablet. Prising it open, Andrea hands Alya a single square of this fudgy treat. Alya takes it and puts it in her mouth, shooting her father a smile that is just as sickly sweet.

Lifting her mug to her lips, Jemma hides her grin behind her tea.

She loves bringing Alya to the Fitz family home. As well as being only an hour away from their own cottage, stepping through the door into Andrea’s kitchen always fills her with a feeling of safety and warmth, as though the house itself is happy to have her visit. And then, of course, there is the way Fitz’s mum dotes on Alya.

Her own parents love their granddaughter too, Jemma knows that. They sit her on their laps and read her storybooks and kiss the top of her head. But they don’t quite understand how she came to be, how it is possible for her to be a little person rather than a tiny baby, and what they don’t understand they are wary of. This in turn makes Alya nervous around them, and makes Jemma all the more grateful that Andrea had accepted her so unquestioningly.

‘What shall we do now, Nana?’ Alya asks, swinging her legs. She licks her fingers, searching for any lingering taste of sugar.

‘Well, now.’ Andrea pauses, pretending to think. She snaps her fingers. ‘Do you know, there’s a rather lonesome looking fir tree in my front room. I reckon if we put some decorations on it, it might look a bit more friendly, don’t you?’

Alya nods eagerly. ‘A Christmas tree!’ she breathes, accepting Andrea’s hand off her stool and jumping through to the living room.

Fitz groans and rolls his eyes. ‘I blame the school,’ he says, coming to stand next to Jemma. ‘She wasn’t at all bothered about Christmas last year. Now it’s Father Christmas this, Christmas trees that. I don’t know if I can do this every year.’

‘Bah humbug,’ Jemma teases. She elbows him in the ribs. ‘But you have to admit, she was adorable in the nativity play last week.’

Fitz shrugs and crosses his arms. ‘I’ve always known she was an angel. She didn’t need a tinsel halo and wings to convince me.’

Knowing that he had secretly filmed the entire show on his phone and proudly shown it to his mother early that day, Jemma keeps quiet. When Andrea pops her head back into the kitchen and beckons for them, they follow her.

The living room looks like an explosion in a festive factory. The real fir tree sits in a red bucket in the corner next to the television set, a bundle of multi-coloured fairy lights spread out in front of it. Boxes of glass baubles and salt-dough decorations are scattered about the furniture, and Alya sits in the middle of it all. Reams and reams of red and green strips of paper surround her, along with child-friendly glue sticks. She holds out the strips in her hands to Jemma.

‘Help, please,’ she says.

‘You and the little star get started on the paperchains,’ Andrea instructs. ‘Meanwhile, Leo can untangle the light strings.’

Fitz and Jemma share a glance, but both of them know better than to do anything other than obey. Kneeling down, Jemma takes the paper strips from Alya and shows her how to loop them together, alternating colours, to create a chain, while Fitz picks up the lights to tease out their knots.

It is not an unpleasant way to spend an afternoon. Outside, the sky grows dark and flashes of headlights pass the window as cars speed by. Inside, Andrea clicks on the electric fire and tunes the radio until she finds a station playing carols. Slowly, the fir tree starts to look like it is dressed for Christmas.

It is still only half-decorated when Andrea disappears into the kitchen to rescue the cake from the oven. Having finished draping the fairy lights around the tree branches, Fitz drifts after her. Jemma and Alya stick at their paper chains, industriously making loop after loop until they are so long they cannot hold them all.

Suddenly, Alya lifts her head with a little gasp.

‘Mama?’

She shifts, uncomfortably, on her heels, wearing an anxious expression Jemma knows only too well. Quickly, she holds out her hand.

‘It’s alright, sweetie. Let’s go and find Nana’s bathroom, shall we?’

Alya clutches her fingers as they climb the stairs, making little hopping steps until they reach the bathroom door. Leaning over the upstairs banisters to wait for her, Jemma hears Andrea and Fitz’s voices drifting upwards from the kitchen.

‘…all I’m saying, Mum, is that if she eats any more now then she isn’t going to want any tea later.’

‘Oh, please. _You_ never had any trouble with that.’

‘Mum…’

‘Alright, alright. She can have a slice with some ice cream after her tea, hmm?’

Jemma grins to herself, imagining the face Fitz must be pulling. He might have battled aliens and robots – not to mention the robot aliens – but when it came to his mother’s will, he was on the losing side every time.

‘You’re spoiling her, you know,’ he says weakly.

‘What kind of grandmother would I be if I didn’t spoil my only grandchild?’ The oven opens, the whirring of the fan growing louder, then it cuts off. ‘Now, if you and Jemma were to give me another…well, then I’d have no choice but to share the spoiling between them.’

‘Ah. Yeah.’ Jemma feels her heart skip a beat as she hears Fitz pause. She can picture him scratching the back of his neck, screwing up his face. ‘Um, about that…’

‘Leo?’ Andrea’s voice is tinged with barely concealed excitement. ‘Is there something you want to tell me?’

‘No! No, I mean, not yet at least.’ There is another pause, and when Fitz speaks again his voice is softer, happier, more hopeful. ‘We’re…we’re trying.’

His words make Jemma’s insides glow and she smiles. Instinctively, she places one hand on her stomach.

She hears Andrea sigh.

‘I’m so happy to hear that, love. Happy for you and Jemma, and for Alya. And also for myself.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ Fitz teases. ‘That eager to be a grandmother twice over, are you?’

‘Well, yes, actually.’ Jemma feels her chest tighten as she hears the unfamiliarly brisk tone of Andrea’s reply. ‘And I’m eager to be able to meet this little one when they’re still a baby, too.’

_Oh_.

Jemma feels just as small as Fitz’s voice sounds, as he says uneasily, ‘Mum…’

‘I’m not blaming you, love,’ Andrea says, gentle once more. ‘You or Jemma. God knows, you deserved some time to yourselves, a little pocket of happiness. I just feel like I’ve missed out on so much with Alya. I don’t want to waste another moment.’

‘I…I know, Mum.’ Fitz swallows. ‘And I understand what it’s like to feel like you’ve lost time. It hurts, and I’m sorry.’

Tears prick at the back of Jemma’s throat as she hears Andrea murmur something she can’t quite make out. There is a quiet shuffling and she imagines they both stepping closer together, Fitz bending down to wrap his mother in a tight hug. When he speaks again, his voice is muffled.

‘Spoil Alya all you like, Mum. And when the new baby comes, you can spoil them too.’

Andrea chuckles. ‘I don’t need your permission, love. But thank you for it all the same.’

The clicking of the bathroom door behind her makes Jemma jump. She quickly brushes away the tears threatening to fall onto her cheeks and turns to smile as Alya joins her on the landing.

‘Did you wash your hands?’

Alya nods, holding them up for inspection. Seeing that they are still slightly damp, with a shiny smear of soap still across her palm, Jemma is satisfied and together they descend the stairs. Once they are back in the hall, Alya skips off to the living room, but, seeing Fitz still standing in the kitchen doorway, staring into space, Jemma hangs back.

Filled with a sudden rush of love for him, she steps forward. Taking his hands in hers, she tugs him down until she can reach his lips. The kiss seems to take Fitz by surprise at first, but he soon eases into it, kissing her back so soundly that Jemma can feel it all the way down to her toes.

She gives his lips one last tender caress before pulling backwards, making Fitz sway on his feet. Slowly, he opens his eyes.

‘What was that for?’ he asks softly, reaching up to stroke her cheek.

Unwilling to tell him that she had been eavesdropping on his whole conversation, Jemma simply shrugs.

‘I just love you. Tremendously.’

Fitz’s smile is as bright as the Christmas lights on the tree.

‘Good.’

Swinging their hands between them, they re-join Andrea and Alya in the living room. ‘Silent Night’ begins to play as Andrea digs the sparkly star out of the last box, and as Fitz lifts Alya up so that she can carefully put it in its rightful place at the top of the tree, Jemma cannot help but think how fitting it is.

Their little star, crowning the Christmas tree with one of its own.

♥

A few days later, they take Alya into Edinburgh to see the Christmas lights.

They’d taken her into Glasgow the year before, but the crowds had still been too much, the noises too loud, the smells too overwhelming, for her to really enjoy it. After ten minutes she’d begged to be picked up and had spent most of the afternoon with her face buried in Fitz’s scarf. They hadn’t even made it to the main street before turning around and heading home.

This year, though, Alya is far more animated. Fitz is right: going to school has made her interest in Christmas, among other things, skyrocket. In retrospect, Jemma thinks, they should have expected this. Being surrounded by her friends, all of them already well versed in the commercial image of Christmas, could have no other outcome. The joy is infectious, the excitement is catching. As they pull into the car park and hear the first peel of ‘Jingle Bells’, Jemma finds that even she herself isn’t immune.

They walk the Royal Mile together, Fitz lifting Alya onto his shoulders when she starts to complain of aching feet. The usual touristy giftshops are dressed to the nines with elaborate light displays and mechanical decorations. This year the theme is the Twelve Days of Christmas, and they pass whole flocks of French hens, platoons of pipers, and dozens of dancing ladies, all creatively crafted from lights. Alya takes it all in, open mouthed.

The best display, though, they all agree, is the castle. Perched high up on its black hill, with every tower and balustrade dripping in warm golden lights, it no longer looks like it belongs on earth. Instead, it looks like a castle in the air.

At the foot of the Mile they find a small fair, complete with a vintage merry-go-round. Alya chooses a cream coloured pony with a lilac and gold saddle and bridle, and waves down at her parents every time she passes. Afterwards, they share a bag of sugary pink candyfloss, most of it ending up around Alya’s mouth. Watching her wipe it away with the back of her glove, it occurs to Jemma quite how much holidays revolved around the sweet treats children could get smeared all over their faces. Opening her handbag, she pulls out a packet of wet wipes.

Alya falls asleep on the way home, tired out from the day’s activities. Leaning back against her headrest, Jemma watches out the window as the light displays continue. As they drive further out of the city, they turn from professionally done displays to lopsided strings of lights outside family homes. They remind her of something but they pass by too quickly for her to latch onto what it is.

She realises that night, as Fitz takes her to bed and their neighbours’ lights shine in through the bedroom window as their kisses turn to touches and their touches turn to love. Winking at her in the dark, they are like stars. Somehow, here on earth, she and Fitz have managed to find constellations of their own.

That Christmas Eve, as Jemma tucks tiny presents into Alya’s stocking there are two secrets that she is keeping.


	3. spring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Hi, it’s me. I know we said you wouldn’t look at your phone while you were meeting Coulson in Aberdeen, but just in case you do…I’m on my way to the school. I got a call this afternoon from one of the teachers, asking to speak to us at the end of the day. You aren’t here, obviously, so I’ll let you know what happens later. It can’t be anything that bad, can it? Oh, don’t look at your texts. I had a bit of a breakdown about it earlier. All fine now, though. Love you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know i said i'd update every other day but i started a teaching course yesterday so uploading this chapter completely slipped my mind! i'm so sorry, hopefully it will be worth the wait! thank you for such kind comments, i've loved reading them all. enjoy this one!

‘Morning.’

‘Umph. Morning.’

‘Happy New Year.’

Groaning, Jemma cracks open half an eye. ‘Is it that again _already_?’

Fitz chuckles and bends forward to kiss her on the tip of her nose. ‘I’m afraid it is. One more year stuck with me.’

‘And I wouldn’t want to be stuck with anyone else,’ Jemma murmurs. Reaching out, she pats him on what she thinks is his shoulder but isn’t quite awake enough to know for sure. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too,’ Fitz whispers back.

Beneath the covers, his hand finds hers. Jemma grins to herself, eyes still closed, as he draws her nearer. His lips begin to travel over her body, crossing her shoulders and sneaking up her neck. They are just about to meet her own lips, when Jemma feels a yawn rise in her throat and she is unable to hold it in.

Fitz sits up with a huff of laughter. ‘Oh, that’s charming, that is.’

‘I’m sorry!’ Jemma chuckles, then is interrupted by another yawn. ‘I’ve just been so _tired_ lately.’

She places heavy emphasis on the word, hoping that he will take the hint. Her genius, time-travel-inventing, alien-language-learning, husband does not.

‘I’ve noticed!’ Grabbing a t-shirt from the chair next to their bed, Fitz shrugs into it. ‘You’ve been sleeping later, snoring on the sofa…that’s usually my job. You’re muscling in on my territory.’ He uses one arm to reach under the bed for his slippers. ‘Tea?’

Jemma nods, pressing a hand over her eyes to shield them from the weak morning sun as he pulls open the curtains. ‘Please.’

Fitz is half-way out the door when a thought occurs to her, and she sits up quickly.

‘Oh, Fitz! Wait a moment.’

‘Yeah?’

He turns back to her, his hair rumpled with sleep. Jemma always thinks that he looks younger in the morning, the boy she’d fallen in love with closer to the surface. It would have made her heart pitter patter even if she didn’t have life-changing news to tell him. She smiles.

‘I think I’d better have the decaf tea this morning.’

It takes a moment for this to sink in. Jemma watches, holding her breath, as the understanding dawns and a grin breaks out onto Fitz’s face that is as radiant as the sunrise. It takes him three strides to cross the room back to her. He sinks back onto the bed and his hands come up to cup her face so he can kiss her again. Jemma returns it eagerly, feeling the tenderness of his love seeping through from his lips into hers.

‘Really?’ he asks, the word coming out in one long breath. He pulls away to gaze down at her. ‘Are you sure?’

Jemma nods, feeling butterflies that could be heartbeats fizz inside her. ‘Mostly. I don’t have the equipment for a blood test anymore, but I think some credence can be given to the do-it-yourself tests I got at the pharmacy.’

‘Maybe just a tad.’ Fitz brushes a stray strand of hair off her face. ‘How far along do you think you are?’

‘Not too far. Maybe only six or seven weeks.’

Fitz frowns as he works this out in his head. ‘So that would mean…’

‘Not long after Guy Fawkes Night,’ Jemma whispers.

Fitz lets out a low whistle. ‘Wow. We really didn’t waste any time with this one, did we?’

Jemma laughs, the sound bubbling up inside her like love. ‘It’s the rest of our lives,’ she points out. ‘Why on earth would we want to wait?’

‘No reason,’ Fitz agrees. ‘No reason at all.’

Their foreheads touch, their hands clasped together in the folds of the duvet.

‘I guess,’ Fitz says slowly after a few moments, ‘we have the answer to our hypothesis now.’

‘Oh!’

Remembering their talk on Guy Fawkes Night, and what had occurred directly after it, Jemma feels her heart skip a beat. She has to bite her lip to stop herself grinning like a fool at the memory.

‘Yes,’ she remarks, ‘You’re right. I guess we do.’

Taking their joint hands, she presses them against the warmth of her still-flat stomach.

‘And soon we’ll have the proof of it.’

Fitz’s smile widens as he bends forward to kiss her again, his free hand coming up to tangle in her hair and his thumb soft over her cheekbone. Jemma leans into the kiss, happy to lose herself in the welcome glow of his happiness.

It is a long time before either of them remember about the tea. When they do, and Fitz bounds down the stairs, whistling, to make it, Jemma rolls over and tucks the duvet up beneath her chin with a private smile.

She’s never been able to find pleasure in keeping things from him. Secrets are always so much sweeter once she’s shared them with Fitz.

♥

In the afternoon after they get back from the twelve-week scan, Jemma goes into the garden. For the next few weeks, apart from meals and to go to bed, she rarely comes out.

She buys packets of vegetable seeds and sows them beneath the dry stone wall. She replants the borders, choosing brightly coloured annuals so they will bloom for them in the years that are to come. With a heavy wax coat on her shoulders and sloppy Wellington boots on her gently swelling feet, she stomps around the garden, considering every corner, and wonders where would be best to put a swing set.

She can tell that Fitz is baffled by this. She’d gone into the scan as any expectant mother would, excited, eager, maybe even a little bit nervous, and she’d come out with a blurry black photograph and an uncontainable itch to be in the garden. He watches her from the kitchen window, hovering anxiously, and Jemma wishes she could tell him what is wrong. She would, if only she knew.

Alya seems untroubled by her mama suddenly taking to living in the garden. In fact, she almost seems to like it. If ever she wants her, Jemma is always somewhere to be found. She takes her own miniature set of garden tools and a beach bucket from the shed and follows her around, occasionally stopping to dig up a small patch of earth. Jemma never fixes these little piles, but steps around them to continue her weeding.

Several times, she tries to stop. She puts down her rake and goes inside, picks up a book, switches on the television. Each time, she makes it maybe fifteen minutes before her fingers start twitching and the restlessness takes her over. Returning to the garden with gritted teeth, Jemma reflects that this is one pregnancy symptom the books had never mentioned.

She is grateful that Fitz never tries to ask her about it, never sits her down for an intervention. If he did, she wouldn’t know what to say, wouldn’t give him an answer that would stop him worrying. Instead, he simply holds her a little tighter at night and places his hands lightly on her stomach. He understands that she needs this comfort at least, and Jemma has never loved him more.

One morning, when she is crouched over a particularly stubborn patch of earth that refuses to yield to her trowel, Jemma looks up to see a thin patch of sunlight breaking through the clouds. It reaches the boughs of the apple tree, making the dew on its leaves glint like diamonds. After months of dark grey skies and cold rain, it is a welcome sight.

With a sigh, Jemma sits back on her heels.

‘Spring really is here,’ she murmurs to herself.

‘I’m not sure about spring,’ someone says dryly behind her. ‘But I think we have maybe an hour before the next rainfall. So that’s something, at least.’

It is the last voice she ever expected to hear at the bottom of her garden in Perthshire, and Jemma is so surprised that she almost drops her trowel in the hole she has just dug. She turns her head.

‘ _May_?’

Melinda May gives what only those who know her best would recognise as a smile. ‘Hi, Simmons. Mind if I join you?’

Wordlessly, Jemma shakes her head. Pushing back the sleeves of her leather jacket, May kneels down next to her and picks up a spare trowel. She starts to dig, a little to the right of where Jemma is digging. After a few more moments getting over her surprise, Jemma joins her.

A sudden slam of the backdoor makes them both look up again. Alya tears across the back lawn, her raincoat flapping unbuttoned around her knees as she calls out, ‘May, May, May, May,’ the name thumping like a heartbeat against the grass.

May’s whole face softens at the sight of the little girl, and she puts out her hands to stop her from tripping as she flings herself into her arms. Pulling Alya back so she can see her properly, she kisses her cheek and says a few words to her in Chinese. Jemma looks on in astonishment as Alya’s smile widens and she nods her head eagerly.

‘ _Xie xie_ ,’ she whispers, then turns on her heel to scamper back the way she came.

Jemma watches her go, then looks to May.

‘Have you been teaching my daughter Mandarin?’

May has turned back to her digging, a small smirk still tugging at her lips. ‘Yoyo’s been teaching her Spanish. I figured another language couldn’t hurt.’

Jemma isn’t quite sure what to say to this, so decides to take a leaf out of May’s book and says nothing at all. Letting out a quiet huff of breath, she picks up her trowel once more.

They continue to dig in silence, all the while questions topple over themselves in Jemma’s mind. She is about to ask May some, when she gets in first.

‘You’ve got a wonderful space here,’ she remarks, nodding to the garden.

‘Oh. Yes.’

Jemma follows her gaze, passing by the apple tree next to the cottage, the green lawn dotted with close-petalled daisies, and the spot cleared by the stone-slabbed patio where Alya’s swing set will go when it arrives. Looking at it in a single sweep like this, she can see how much progress she has made in a few short weeks.

‘I’m rather fond of it, actually.’

May points to a space by the back wall, where the grass has been dug up to leave a rectangle of freshly turned earth. ‘What’s going there?’

‘Fitz is building me an orangery,’ Jemma explains. ‘Or a lemon-ery, seeing as I want to grow a lemon tree in there. For Deke,’ she clarifies, probably unnecessarily as she sees the corners of May’s mouth twitch in recognition.

‘He’d like that,’ May says softly.

Jemma nods, but thinking about the orangery and Deke makes something inside her twist like a garden fork in a patch of soil. Sniffing, she digs her trowel down deep in the hope that this will abate the churning in the pit of her stomach. Beside her, May winces.

‘Jemma? Can we talk about what you’re feeling?’

Jemma shakes her head. ‘I…I don’t really know what I’m feeling.’

‘Then let’s try and find out together.’ Gently, May rests a hand on top of hers. ‘Just…talk about it.’

Taking a deep breath, Jemma pushes down with her trowel. It jars in her hand, hitting a stone buried in the earth, and it feels like she has struck gold.

‘I feel guilty.’

May closes her eyes briefly and nods, as though she too had been struggling to put a name to the tightening around her heart. But she doesn’t say anything, which is just as well, because now Jemma has begun the words are coming easily, like the floodgates have been opened.

‘Deke’s mother was born in space. So was Alya. Fitz and I…we did what we could but everything we had was so rudimentary. We couldn’t even do a proper ultrasound, so we had no idea what she looked like until she was here.’ Thinking of the grainy black and white image pined to the fridge, Jemma bites her lip. ‘Everything about this pregnancy is going to be so different.’

‘Surely that’s a good thing.’

‘Well…yes,’ Jemma says hesitantly. ‘But everything else is going to be different too. Alya spent her whole babyhood on the Zephyr. She had limited books, toys. She could never go outside. She didn’t get to meet her grandparents, or all of you, until she was three. What if she becomes jealous?’

May seems to consider this. Her hand slides off of Jemma’s and she rubs her palms on her jeans. ‘Do you think she would?’

‘I don’t know,’ Jemma admits. ‘She knows she was brought up in a different place to her friends at school, but that’s just made her more curious than anything else. I don’t think I’ve seen her be jealous. But to see a brother or sister have such a different beginning to the one she had…’ Tears suddenly mist her eyes. ‘I don’t want my children to be jealous of each other.’

‘Of course not,’ May says. She sighs. ‘You’ve thought a lot about what’s going to be different. What about the things that will be the same?’

Jemma frowns.

May sits back, balancing on her heels so that she isn’t touching the damp grass.

‘Listen, Jemma. If there’s anything I’ve learnt over the past year, it’s that emotions are messy.’

‘You hadn’t noticed that before?’ Jemma asks, arching an eyebrow.

May rolls her eyes.

‘Teaching teenagers wakes you up to it,’ she says, ‘trust me. Standing in a room with two dozen of them is enough to melt your brain. Everything they feel is so complicated.’ She looks at Jemma. ‘But the love that you and Fitz share…that’s the simplest thing I’ve ever felt.’

Jemma feels her cheeks flush. Reaching out, May touches her shoulder.

‘You give that love to Alya,’ she says with a soft voice, ‘just the same as you’re going to give it to the new baby, and to any more babies the two of you choose to have. In the grand scheme of things, don’t you think that’s a lot more important than where they were born?’

Blinking slowly, Jemma thinks about this. The longer she does, the clearer things seem to be and the looser her chest feels. She feels lighter, as if the realisation that May is right has lifted the weight of the world from her. She sets down her trowel.

‘Thank you, May,’ she whispers.

May nods at her, her own expression looking a little easier. Jemma supposes that is what it is to be an empath – lessening your own pain by helping ease someone else’s. It feels right for May, as though this was how she was always meant to be. Or how she always was.

‘Glad I could help,’ she says. Taking up both their trowels, she dumps them in the yellow garden tub Jemma keeps beside her kneeler. ‘And if you and Fitz ever feel like taking the kids up to Theta Serpentis, to show the new baby where their sister grew up…’ She shrugs. ‘I’m not opposed to taking one last flight for old time’s sake.’

At the thought of May taking her and Fitz’s family back to the stars where Alya was born, Jemma smiles.

‘I’ll think about it.’

She gets to her feet, rather ungainly, and holds out her hand for to help May up too. Once they are both upright again, backs and ankles aching, Jemma takes May’s arm to walk her back up to the house.

‘Will you stay for dinner?’

‘If I’m allowed,’ May says, one eye on the kitchen window.

Half-frowning, Jemma laughs. ‘Why on earth wouldn’t you be allowed? We’d be delighted to have you!’

‘I brought Alya a present,’ May tells her.

‘Oh, May! You shouldn’t have.’ A little puzzled about how the two things are connected, Jemma squeezes her arm affectionately. ‘That’s so kind of you, thank you.’

‘I took her off a group of my students yesterday. Didn’t ask what they were planning on doing with her, didn’t really want to know. I was trying to think about what to do with her when Fitz gave me a call. I think she’s housetrained. Or mostly, at least. I picked up a bag of cat litter on my way, just in case.’

Jemma opens her mouth, about to ask her if she is joking, when a yelp from the open back door stops them both in their tracks.

‘JEMMA!’ Fitz’s voice seems to echo off the surrounding hills. ‘Why is there a CAT on our KITCHEN TABLE?’

Slapping her hand over her mouth, Jemma tries very hard not to laugh.

‘Is there any way,’ May asks casually, ‘for me to take that dinner to go?’

♥

Jemma is trying to toilet train the kitten when the telephone rings. Perdy – the name had been Alya’s choice, Perdy seems utterly unbothered that her namesake is a dalmatian – has an aversion to the litter tray even when it has been freshly lain and prefers to do her business on the floor beside it instead.

‘I will crack you, you know,’ Jemma warns her as she gropes for her mobile on the kitchen island. ‘I’ve done this before, and soon I will be doing it again. All you’re doing is giving me more practice.’

Lifting her wide amber eyes upwards, Perdy gives a mew that Jemma hopes is not her cat laughing at her. She drags her attention away from the tiny feline and to her phone screen. When she sees the that the caller ID reads _school_ , her heart plummets into her shoes.

Two hours later, Jemma is in the car on her way to collect Alya. As she drives, she uses the hands-free system to leave Fitz a voice message.

‘Hi, it’s me. I know we said you wouldn’t look at your phone while you were meeting Coulson in Aberdeen, but just in case you do…I’m on my way to the school. I got a call this afternoon from one of the teachers, asking to speak to us at the end of the day. You aren’t here, obviously, so I’ll let you know what happens later. It can’t be anything that bad, can it? Oh, don’t look at your texts. I had a bit of a breakdown about it earlier. All fine now, though. Love you.’

Jemma is fairly certain she knows what this is about. It had taken her a little while to remember, hence the aforementioned breakdown, but once she’d been able to think about it calmly, she’d recalled something that had happened at Alya’s parents evening. Her class teacher, whom Alya adored – not the man she’d spoken to on the phone, but a young woman with frizzy black hair and a red-lipped smile – had enthused about Alya’s brightness and friendliness but raised concerns over her dislike of sharing and taking turns.

‘It’s very common with only children,’ she’d assured them. ‘Most grow out of it by the end of their first year at school.’

Despite this, Fitz and Jemma had spent many long evenings playing board games with Alya, hoping that these would help her pick up on how important it was to allow everyone to take a turn.

Hurrying through the school playground, where parents are gathering to watch their children use the play equipment before heading home, Jemma can picture the scene perfectly. Alya, laying claim to a swing or a colouring pen or a book, and another child wanting to use it too. However intellectually advanced her daughter might be, she is still only four. When things don’t go her way, she is not above resorting to tears to try and change this.

Jemma is already planning how she and Fitz will deal with this as she is lead to a bright blue door by the school secretary. She knocks, then pushes it open.

‘Mr Hayes?’

‘Ah!’ A middle-aged man with thinning blonde hair and a jacket with tweet patches at the elbows jumps up from behind a desk. Alya sits on a small plastic chair in front of him, swinging her legs and looking as unbothered as Perdy the cat. ‘You must be Mrs Fitz-Simmons,’ he says, coming forward to shake her hand.

Alya frowns, and Jemma raises one eyebrow at her in warning before she can correct him. Alya is very proud of the fact that both her parents are _doctors_.

‘Please,’ she asks quickly, ‘may I ask what the problem is?’

‘Of course, of course.’ Mr Hayes waves her over to his desk. Glancing at Alya, he gives her a smile. ‘Alya, would you like to go and collect your things? I asked the caretaker to keep Miss Fisher’s classroom open for you.’

Alya slides off her chair and makes for the door, giving her mother a meaningful look that Jemma cannot quite decipher as she goes. As soon as she is gone, Mr Hayes clears his throat.

‘Please, sit.’

Jemma lowers herself into the chair Alya has vacated as gracefully as she can – over the last week or so, her bump has begun to grow almost daily. The fact that the chair is made for someone far smaller than she would ordinarily be anyway makes this even more difficult. She hopes that she will be able to climb back out again.

‘You and your husband may be aware,’ Mr Hayes begins, ‘that Alya’s class topic this term is space.’

Jemma freezes. Ah. So _that_ is what this is about.

When Alya had come home, waving the letter about the new topic as she danced around the kitchen, she and Fitz had exchanged nervous glances. The problem began but did not end with the fact that their daughter’s knowledge of the universe far outstripped that of her teachers, let alone her peers. Alya was not the kind of person to sit silently when she had something to say. If she had something to add, to elaborate, or correct, she would say it. Fitz and Jemma both knew that with this particular topic her remarks could trigger some rather awkward questions for them about her early life. Needless to say, neither of them had been looking forward to it.

Uncomfortable on her too-small chair, Jemma squirms.

‘Yes. We’re aware.’

Mr Hayes leans backwards, his own chair perfectly sized for a grown human. ‘I have a particular passion for astronomy, so offered to help Miss Fisher with some of the activities. On her day off today, the children and I build some constellations.’

He gestures above their heads and Jemma looks up. Pined to the ceiling are lengths of string with white and silver and gold stars attached, arranged in the shapes of recognisable constellations. Luggage tags are attached with names and positions. In the centre of the room, the lightbulb has been covered with a yellow lantern, representing the sun, and papier-mâché balls in bright colours ring the classroom like planets. It is, Jemma must admit, an impressive display.

‘How lovely,’ she murmurs.

Mr Hayes looks pleased. ‘Thank you. As I was pining them in place, I was telling the children the stories of the constellations. Soon, I became aware that someone was speaking under me. Alya, as it happens. It appears she was telling her friends stories of her own.’

‘Oh.’ Jemma winces. Of course Alya would want to share her own constellation stories. ‘I’m terribly sorry, Mr Hayes. She ought to know not to talk when a teacher is talking.’

Waving this away, Mr Hayes shakes his head. ‘I’m afraid that’s not the problem, Mrs Fitz-Simmons. You see, when I asked Alya to share with the class what she was saying, the stories she told about the stars were…well, wrong.’

Jemma blinks at him. Then, unable to stop herself, she snorts.

‘Mr Hayes, they’re _stars_. Hundreds of cultures, across time, have created their own stories from their patterns. The Egyptians, the Maori, the ancient Aztecs, to name a few. I hardly think Alya was doing anything revolutionary.’

‘Indeed not.’ Mr Hayes spreads his hands. ‘My concern is that she was telling these stories to the other children. She was encouraging them to believe something that isn’t true.’

For a moment, Jemma doesn’t know what to say. She is tempted simply to laugh. It feels utterly absurd that this man, who has possibly never left this island before in his life, could dare to suggest that her daughter is telling untruths about the stars she has lived between. They are a part of her, in ways he will never understand. Realising this makes Jemma feel calmer.

With a smooth smile, she decides that she has heard enough.

‘Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Mr Hayes,’ she says, putting one hand on the back of her chair to lift herself out of it. She manages it more decorously than she’d have thought possible. ‘I can assure you that my husband and I will talk to Alya about speaking out of turn. However,’ she adds quickly before the teacher can butt in, ‘we won’t be reprimanding her for telling her stories.’

Emboldened by the frown on his forehead, Jemma takes a step closer.

‘My daughter loves stories. She is an excellent storyteller. I don’t plan on asking her to stop just because they are different to the ones you prefer.’

She draws herself upright, at the exact moment that Alya returns to the room. She has her coat in one hand, trailing it on the ground after her, and her rucksack over her shoulder. Jemma smiles at her and moves over to take her hand.

‘Alya, sweetie, is there anything you’d like to say to Mr Hayes?’

Alya nods. ‘I’m very sorry, Mr Hayes,’ she says politely, ‘for talking when I should have been listening.’

Pride swells in Jemma’s chest, an emotion she’d never thought she’d feel after being called into school to discuss her daughter’s behaviour. As she takes in the strained expression on Mr Hayes’ face, she finds herself feeling a smug satisfaction too.

She is about to ask him loftily if there is anything else he would like to talk about before sweeping Alya from the room with their heads held high, when Alya opens her mouth to speak again.

‘Also,’ she says, pointing upwards, ‘you forgot a star in Orion.’

Jemma decides to skip their dignified exit. It is probably best that they leave before Alya notices that he has put Saturn and Neptune the wrong way around too.

‘I’m home!’ The slam of the front door announces Fitz’s arrival even before he calls out. ‘I bought the chippy dinner you asked for. They didn’t have nuggets for Alya, so I got fishcakes instead. I’ll just put them on the plates…okay, no plates out. Are we eating them out of the paper, then? I’m up for that, nothing better than a chippy dinner from the paper. Is anyone around to eat it with me?’ His voice grows louder as he travels through the house in search of them. ‘Hello? Jemma? Alya? Are you here?’

Jemma hears the click of the dining room door and reaches up to pin one last sheet of paper into place before turning around. Standing in the doorway, Fitz does a double take.

‘What…?’

He doesn’t get a chance to finish his question. Perdy, sensing an opportunity for escape, leaves off cleaning her paws on the table and takes a flying leap onto the floor. She darts between his legs with a long miaow that might have been a cry of ‘ _freedom!’_.

The appearance of her father makes Alya, who has spent the last hour slumped over a maths worksheet, slowly sliding further and further down her chair, look up, suddenly alert.

‘Fi-na-lly,’ she says, stressing every syllable. She slithers off the chair to the floor and bounds after Perdy.

Fitz watches her go with a look of bewilderment.

‘Where’s she off to?’

Glancing at her watch, Jemma grimaces. ‘Probably to eat. I didn’t realise it was so late already.’ She steps around the table to throw her arms around him. ‘You’re home!’

As she hugs him tight, Jemma feels something like relief settle in her stomach. Although she’d spent the day mostly distracted, she’d never been able to shake off the cold fear of what she would do if he never came back. This fear has lessened over the last year and a half, going from something that paralysed to something that pricked, but it still made its presence felt every time they were apart.

Pressing her face to his jacket, Jemma lets Fitz’s arms reassure her that he is safe and the last of her worries ebb away like the tide going softly out on the shore.

‘I’m home,’ Fitz agrees, and kisses her neck to prove it. ‘Everything okay here?’ Gently, he pulls back to take her in, anxiously running his hands down the side of her face and the swell of her bump. ‘Are _you_ okay?’

Jemma nods and squeezes his fingers in reassurance. A strong tenderness for him fills her as he reaffirms his concern with another kiss, this time to her lips. Somehow, it makes her feel better to know that however worried she has been, he has been feeling the same way. They weren’t alone, even in this.

‘I’m fine,’ she says, smiling as they break apart once more. ‘Really. How was Coulson?’

‘Oh, good, good.’ Fitz nods. He is still holding her hands, his thumbs rubbing warm circles on her palms. ‘He sends his love, of course. And a new book for Alya, some arty collector’s edition of _The Enchanted Wood_. I left it next to her dinner.’ Abruptly, he frowns. ‘Unless we shouldn’t be rewarding her today?’

‘Hmm?’ It takes Jemma a moment to remember the garbled voice message and texts she’d sent him that afternoon. ‘Oh, that!’

‘Do we need to talk about it?’ Fitz asks. He glances over his shoulder and lowers his voice. ‘Was it…you know. The sharing thing?’

‘No, no.’ Jemma shakes her head. ‘That’s what I thought it would be about too, but it wasn’t at all. Can I tell you later? There’s something else I want to talk about first.’

Fitz narrows his eyes at her. ‘Okay. But first, can I just know: is it something we need to punish or reward her for?’

Jemma considers this. ‘Both,’ she says carefully. ‘I’ve already punished by making her do an extra worksheet instead of watching television before dinner. And now you’ve rewarded with a new book!’ Balancing herself on her tip toes, she leans up to give him an exuberant kiss. ‘We’re parenting perfectly tonight.’

Fitz chuckles against her lips as he steadies her. ‘Alright, alright. You’re clearly excited. What is it you wanted to talk about?’

Taking a deep breath, Jemma steps backwards. ‘I said _talk_ ,’ she says, ‘but what I really meant was _show_.’

She tugs on his fingers and, as always, Fitz follows after her. Jemma leads him around the table to show him what she has been working on since the moment she and Alya had stepped out of the school.

‘I think I’ve found our project.’

The idea had come to her in a flash, springing into her mind already fully formed. If she was feeling generous, she’d have to credit Mr Hayes with inspiring her, but Jemma wasn’t feeling that generous. Instead, she chooses to think of Alya as her inspiration.

As soon as they’d got home, Jemma had commandeered the dining room, borrowing Alya’s crayons and untying the washing line from the garden. She’d strung the line up in the rafters and begun to work. Wearing the crayons down to stubs, she scribbled plan after plan, wanting to get it all down onto paper before it left her mind. Ideas like this never did, but she didn’t want to risk it. She’d pegged every sheet onto the line in order, creating a kind of map along the walls.

Some of her drawings are a bit rough, but she hopes that Fitz will be able to fix them. She hopes that, while she takes care of the words, he will take care of the pictures. It will be a different kind of collaboration for them, something brand new.

Jemma watches Fitz turn in slow circles, taking it all in. She watches him read the map and smile, as though he can read where it will lead them.

‘What do you think?’ she whispers.

Fitz turns to her, and Jemma can see tears shining in his eyes.

‘I think it’s perfect.’


	4. summer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As he leans in to kiss her once more, Jemma thinks about how lucky she is to have him. She had been lucky on the Zephyr and she is lucky now, in a home of their own with grass beneath them and sky above them. Her cravings might come and go, but the one thing she will always want is him by her side.
> 
> ‘Satisfied?’ Fitz murmurs against her lips.
> 
> Jemma smiles. More than you know. ‘Yes.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have to apologise (again) for not replying to your comments on the last chapter yet!! i had to figure out several different virtual learning platforms today and it's completely wiped me out and i have no coherent thoughts left. i promise i will get to them tomorrow to give them the responses they deserve, thank you all so much for leaving them 💕
> 
> this is my favourite chapter, i think, so i hope you enjoy it too!

Jemma takes her time with the stairs, considering where will be safest to place her foot before descending to the next one. She tries to be light-footed too, which is easier said than done at this stage of her pregnancy. A light might have helped her but also might have alerted someone else to her late-night wanderings, which Jemma is keen to avoid. She is determined to do this as inconspicuously as possible.

When she passes the step Perdy likes to sleep on, Alya’s cat lazily opens one eye. Then, with a soft mew, she stretches and begins to follow, jumping down one step at a time.

Jemma exhales with relief when they both reach the bottom of the stairs. She feels her way along the wall to the kitchen, Perdy’s tail brushing against her bare leg in companionable silence. Once in the kitchen, Jemma switches on the free-standing light by the table and immediately goes to open the cupboard. Behind a packet of pasta, she spies what feels like the only thing that will ever satisfy the growling in her stomach.

Five minutes later, Jemma is sitting at the kitchen table, a plate of crumpets topped with marmite and cheese in front of her. The rising steam smells utterly intoxicating and Jemma can feel her mouth water as she lifts her midnight snack to her lips.

‘Jemma?’

The crumpet slips from her grip and Jemma almost moans out loud. She can feel the melted butter dripping down her fingers.

Fitz steps out of the darkness, rubbing his eyes. Jemma tries not to look guilty as he blinks at the scene in front of him.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Just…’ She gestures to the plate in front of her. ‘Having a snack.’

‘At two o’clock in the morning?’ Fitz’s words are muffled by a yawn. He steps forward and pulls out the chair next to her to sit down. ‘Jemma, is this a craving?’

‘Possibly. Probably. Most likely.’ Jemma grimaces at him. ‘I couldn’t wait until morning.’

Fitz chuckles. ‘I can see that.’ He peers at her plate and leans forward to poke at a crumpet. ‘That’s a, uh, interesting combination.’

Jemma slaps his fingers away. ‘If you want to try it, get your own.’

She picks up a crumpet and takes a bite. The cheese has melted perfectly and the marmite has sunk down into the bubbles of the batter. It tastes even better than she’d imagined. Jemma closes her eyes, trying to savour the bliss.

When she opens them again, she finds Fitz watching her, smiling, his chin cupped in his hand.

‘It’s odd, you having cravings,’ he observes, nudging her shoulder. ‘You didn’t have any with Alya.’

Jemma ducks her head, giving him an uncommitted nod, and picks up the second crumpet. Her heart starts to thump against her pyjamas.

‘Wait.’ She can hear the frown in Fitz’s voice. ‘Jemma? _Did_ you have cravings?’

‘A few,’ she admits. She gives him an apologetic look. ‘I…I just didn’t tell you.’

Fitz shakes his head. ‘Why wouldn’t you tell me?’

Five months ago, this would have been a difficult question for Jemma to answer. It isn’t exactly easy now, but, remembering her conversation with May, she takes a deep breath.

‘I didn’t want to worry you. You were already so worked up about not being able to get me an ultrasound, or prenatal vitamins, or pregnancy pillows.’ She gives him a little shrug and a smile. ‘Next to those, not being able to eat crumpets with marmite seemed a little trivial.’

‘It wouldn’t have been to me,’ Fitz says quietly.

‘I know it wouldn’t have,’ Jemma whispers. Hating to see him look so hurt, she rests her hand on top of his closed fist. ‘I’m sorry. If I could go back and do it again, I would tell you.’

‘Oh, yeah?’ Fitz looks up at her.

‘Yeah. And then I’d make you listen to descriptions of all the snacks I wanted, in _excruciating_ detail.’

Fitz gives a huff of laughter and unfurls his fingers, allowing hers to slip between them. ‘I’d listen,’ he says, ‘and probably end up craving them just as much as you.’

With a chuckle, Jemma lets her head fall until it is resting on his shoulder. Fitz shifts his arm to accommodate her and presses a kiss to her temple.

‘I’d have tried to get them for you too,’ he mumbles. ‘Just so you know.’

Feeling her heart contract, Jemma nods against him. ‘I know.’ She twists her head towards him. ‘Thank you.’

‘You’re welcome,’ Fitz says, bending down to kiss her, lightly, on her lips. Jemma tilts her face upwards for the kiss, like the petals of a flower seeking the sun.

They sit in silence for a while, Jemma polishing off her crumpet while Fitz rubs delicate patterns on her shoulder with his forefinger. The sky outside is still dark enough for it to feel like they are the only two people for miles around. Of course, they both know perfectly well what they feels like.

‘So,’ Fitz says, once Jemma has licked the last of the cheesy marmite from her fingers, ‘what else were you craving with Alya that you didn’t tell me about?’

Jemma sits back, pondering this. Her pregnancy with Alya feels so long ago and yet still so close. Thinking back on it feels like thinking about yesterday, but from the distance of a lifetime.

‘My mum,’ she says eventually. ‘Hot chocolate with whipped cream. Bras that fit me properly. Oh, and being in a decent bath. Or a pool. Anywhere filled with water where I could feel weightless.’

‘If you’d asked,’ Fitz remarked, ‘we could have just turned off the gravity control for a while.’

‘Because _that_ would have worked _so_ well.’

‘Well, we never tried it, so now we’re never gonna know.’

Jemma snorts softly, shaking her head.

‘Right.’ Fitz counts her list off on his fingers. ‘We saw your mum a few weeks ago, and you went bra-shopping only the other day.’

‘Yes. And our bathtub upstairs is adequate for floating.’

Fitz sucks in through his teeth pensively. ‘ _Adequate_ doesn’t really feel good enough.’

‘No? What do you have in mind, then?’

‘Let me think on it and get back to you.’

‘How about my hot chocolate?’ Jemma asks.

Reaching up, she turns his face towards hers with her fingertips. Fitz grins and catches them.

‘I’ll pick up a can of cream tomorrow.’

As he leans in to kiss her once more, Jemma thinks about how lucky she is to have him. She had been lucky on the Zephyr and she is lucky now, in a home of their own with grass beneath them and sky above them. Her cravings might come and go, but the one thing she will always want is him by her side.

‘Satisfied?’ Fitz murmurs against her lips.

Jemma smiles. _More than you know_. ‘Yes.’

‘Good.’ Pushing back his chair, Fitz helps her to her feet, one palm held steadily in the small of her back. ‘We’ve got that meeting with the publisher tomorrow about the project. And while you don’t need any more beauty sleep, I certainly do.’

Jemma rolls her eyes, but allows him to lead her out of the kitchen and back up the stairs to bed.

♥

In early June, Alya turns five.

They throw her a party, inviting every child in her class because Alya tells them that is what all the other parents do and they have no reason not to believe her. For one unseasonably hot afternoon, Fitz and Jemma’s home is taken over by sticky-fingered children and their hovering parents, all of them eager to be out in the garden enjoying the sunshine.

The party’s theme is ‘under the sea’, insisted on by Alya, who currently has plans to become a submarine driver when she is older. The bouncy castle is in the shape of a coral reef, the party bags decorated with various coloured-fish, and the birthday cake has been carefully crafted into the shape of a shell.

As she adds a last layer of buttercream to the cake, Jemma thinks that there is something poignant about her daughter’s two favourite places being the stars and the sea. They were the places where she and Fitz lost and found each other, bookends to a chapter of their lives that changed everything. If she were a poet, Jemma might have found something more lyrical to think about it. But she is a scientist, so instead she tries to find what connects the two places. She latches onto the idea of the unknown, of the need to explore and uncover.

Gazing out of the window, she watches as Alya leaps higher and higher on the bouncy castle, her hands reaching upwards and splayed outwards like starfish. Whatever it is her daughter is seeking, Jemma knows that, one day, she will find it.

Their guests begin to drift away once the evening comes, pieces of shell cake wrapped in napkins in their pockets. The bouncy castle starts to be deflated. Worn out by sugar and sun, Alya falls sleep on the grass and Fitz picks her up to carry her inside to bed. Now seven and a half months pregnant, Jemma half-wishes he’d do the same for her. She runs sink after sink of hot, bubbly water and starts to wash up the piles of glasses and plates left on the side, the casualties of the afternoon. When Fitz comes back down, he picks up the tea towel to dry them and they share a smile that is tired and happy at the same time.

All in all, for their first birthday party, it is quite the success.

♥

A week later, Jemma is in the living room responding to emails from their publisher. She has her feet up on Fitz’s lap and her laptop on her protruding bump, and is so focused on her typing that she doesn’t hear Alya come into the room until she is right beside her, panting hard.

‘There’s a plane landing in the field,’ she announces to them. Then, without pausing for breath, she turns around and runs back the way she had come.

Fitz and Jemma look at each other. The glasses Fitz has taken to wearing when he reads have slipped down his nose and are making his face seem rather lopsided. The startled expression he is wearing beneath them does not help. In unison, they put aside what they had been doing and hurry out after Alya.

Fitz runs faster, of course, so by the time Jemma arrives at the gate that leads out to the field he is already greeting the pilot of the familiar-shaped plane that has landed in the grass.

Jemma laughs out loud as she recognises her.

‘Daisy!’

Daisy beams, and hurries across the field to meet her. Alya dances around her feet, clearly delighted at the morning’s turn of events.

‘Hey!’ Daisy chuckles as she wraps Jemma in a tight hug. ‘I’m looking for the Fitz-Simmons residence. Am I in the right place?’

‘You _know_ you are,’ Fitz says, appearing behind them. He has a dark lipstick mark on his cheek that he is rubbing at, but seems to be rather pleased about. ‘Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?’

‘Uh, because I didn’t realise I was! We re-entered the atmosphere last night, somewhere over London. While Sousa and Cora took the Zephyr back to base, I figured I could make a quick stop-off in the Highlands.’

‘Well, we aren’t _technically_ in the Highlands,’ Fitz begins, but Jemma cuts him off.

‘And we’re delighted that you did!’ Moving forward, she tucks her arm into Daisy’s to lead her back towards the cottage. ‘You look incredible, by the way.’

Daisy grins and tosses her hair. The ombre-blonde dye looks freshly done – Jemma supposes they’d left the hair styling equipment stocked on the Zephyr after returning to the twenty-first century.

‘Thanks. You look…’ She trails off, aware that she is wandering into a danger zone, and Fitz steps behind her to mumble something in her ear. ‘Uh, ravishing.’

Seeing Fitz give her a thumbs up, Jemma rolls her eyes. ‘You’re both liars and I love you awfully.’

They walk, three abreast and with Alya skipping on ahead, back across the field and through the garden gate. Daisy gives a low whistle as they approach the cottage.

‘Wow. I mean, I’d seen pictures and heard Yoyo’s gushing, but seriously. Wow. This place is incredible.’

‘Well now, it’s no edge-of-the-galaxy-in-a-spaceship,’ Fitz teases, earning him an elbow in the ribs, ‘but I suppose it’s not too bad.’

‘Uh, yeah. I guess you could say that.’ Looking over at Jemma, Daisy gives her a suddenly watery smile and squeezes her arm. ‘It’s completely and utterly perfect for you guys.’

Feeling a warm appreciation for her friend, Jemma smiles back at her. ‘Oh, we like to think so. Now!’ She pats Daisy’s hand. ‘Tea? Coffee?’

‘I’ll get some chairs out,’ Fitz offers, making for the shed, ‘we can sit out here and catch up.’

‘Oh! Uh, guys, that’s super sweet of you, but…’ Daisy pulls a face. ‘I’m not actually here to see the two of you. I’m here because a little birdy told me it was somebody’s birthday.’

Alya, who had up until this moment been picking stray clovers out of the grass, perks up. She skips over and gives Daisy a practiced pout.

‘You’re a week late, Auntie Daisy.’

‘I know I am, baby. But I promise I’ve got a very good excuse.’ Daisy ducks down and wiggles her fingers, expertly tickly Alya’s neck and armpits until she is helpless with giggles. Then, she scoops her up to sit her on her hip and leans in close. ‘I was in _space_.’

‘I’ve been to space too,’ Alya observes. She reaches out and tangles her fingers in Daisy’s hair. ‘It’s not _that_ good an excuse.’

‘Alya!’ Fitz and Jemma exclaim together, but Daisy tips back her head and bursts out laughing.

‘Okay!’ Balancing Alya with one hand, she wipes her eyes with the other. ‘You’ve got me there, baby girl. I guess I’ll just have to trust in my _awesome_ present to convince you to forgive me.’

Jemma watches Alya gasp, her eyes lighting up.

‘What present?’ she breathes, peering over Daisy’s shoulder as if she is expecting it to manifest on the lawn.

‘Me!’ Daisy jumps a little on the spot. ‘I’m the present! I’m here for the whole day, and ready for some first-class bonding with my best friend.’

Jemma isn’t sure who looks more disappointed: Alya or Fitz.

‘I thought we were your best friends,’ he says, pointing between Jemma and himself as Alya wiggles down from Daisy’s grasp.

‘Yeah, well.’ Daisy gives him an exaggerated shrug. ‘I guess you should have thought of that before you decided to combine your DNA.’

She flashes them a wicked grin and turns to grab Alya’s hand. Together, the two of them take off into the garden, leaving Fitz and Jemma far behind.

Jemma is still gazing after them when she feels Fitz’s arm snake around her shoulders.

‘A tenner says,’ he murmurs in her ear, ‘that she taps out by four o’clock.’

Glancing at her watch and seeing that it is only just eleven, Jemma decides to take the bet. After all, Daisy has fought more battles than she could count on her fingers. She’s travelled the galaxy and back again and made it look effortless. What kind of damage could a five-year-old do to stamina like that in a few hours?

Trusting the crisp ten-pound note in her purse to her friend’s resilience, Jemma takes Fitz’s outstretched hand.

‘You’re on.’

Daisy falls backwards into the chair, but Jemma is fairly sure that if it hadn’t been there she’d have flopped onto the grass just as happily.

‘I take it all back,’ she says, her chest rising and falling like she’s just run a marathon. ‘I don’t think there’s anything in the world more exhausting than being a parent.’

Pushing back her jumper, Jemma checks her watch. It is ten minutes past four. Smirking, she rolls her sleeve down again. Daisy, now recovering her breath, opens one eye at her.

‘What are you grinning about?’

‘Nothing!’

Jemma puts her book aside and offers her a drink of lemonade. Daisy takes it grateful and drains the glass. Replacing it on the small wooden table between them, she gazes out at the garden where Alya is still playing.

‘Does she _ever_ run out of energy?’ she asks.

Jemma chuckles. ‘Oh, yes. She’s out for the count at seven pm, every night like clockwork.’

‘Oh, God.’ Daisy groans. ‘That’s so much _time_.’

Watching Alya lift up her hula hoop to shimmy it about her hips, Jemma notices for the first time how many spins she is able to manage before it drops. She bites her lip. Every time she looks at her daughter, it feels like she has grown just a little bit more.

‘No,’ she murmurs, half to herself, ‘it’s really not.’

Daisy gives her a quizzical look that, once she sees what Jemma is staring at, softens. When she holds out her hand, Jemma takes it, drawing comfort from the warmth of Daisy’s fingers. But when Daisy starts to swing their joined hands, giving her dopey eyes, Jemma cracks up with laughter.

‘Alright, alright!’ She wipes her eyes with the back of her free hand. ‘I’m done being soppy now.’ Letting go of Daisy’s hand, she leans on the arm of the chair and cups her chin in her palm. ‘What’s the news? What’s Mack got lined up for you at the Lighthouse now you’re back on solid ground?’

‘Honestly? I’m not sure.’ Daisy sighs. ‘I know that there’s a bunch of new inhumans he’s trying to help. I met a couple on Zoom a while back.’

Jemma nods. ‘From the Galapagos. Fitz designed the hydrokinetic some gauntlets like yours.’

‘And they really helped her,’ Daisy says, flashing her a grateful smile. ‘But I think the others are still struggling to come to terms with it all. It’s, like, a lot.’

‘I know,’ Jemma says softly. ‘I can remember what it was like for you.’

Daisy shrugs. ‘I think Mack’s hoping I can help them understand. Yoyo’s tried, but she prefers being out in the field.’

‘He needs an ambassador,’ Jemma notes. She looks across at Daisy. ‘That’ll be perfect for you.’

Daisy pulls a face, but Jemma can tell that the prospect excites her. ‘Yeah, well. We’ll see how it goes. I can’t lie, I’m kinda curious to see what Mack’s done to the place too. I’m half-expecting it to still be stuck in a seventies time warp.’ She hesitates, her expression suddenly pensive. ‘It’s not going to be the same without you two, though.’

Jemma sighs. ‘I know.’

‘I miss you,’ Daisy admits, her eyes suddenly wet with tears.

Blinking back her own, Jemma reaches out to stroke the back of her friend’s hand, the way she does for Alya when she is upset. She remembers her own spells of homesickness, that would probably be more accurately labelled _family_ sickness. Her heart aches to see how badly Daisy is feeling it too.

‘You know where we are,’ she says softly. ‘And we aren’t planning on going anywhere else. You’re welcome at any time, Daisy.’

‘Thanks.’ Daisy gives her a watery smile and sniffs. ‘It’s just…getting used to it. You know?’

Jemma thinks back on dazed days when she’d risen at the crack of dawn in search of a lab that didn’t exist and pulled back curtains to stare in wonder at the rising sun. She smiles.

‘It gets easier,’ she tells Daisy. ‘Trust me.’

‘Oh, hey,’ Daisy says after a few moment’s silence. ‘I almost forgot.’

Bending sideways out of her chair, she gropes for her bag. Unzipping it, she reaches inside and rummages around until she finds what she is looking for. Triumphantly, she pulls out a small blue jewellery box and places it on the table in front of them.

Jemma stares at it. ‘Daisy, darling, I’m flattered but you and I both know I’m happily married.’

‘It’s not for _you_!’ Daisy rolls her eyes. ‘It’s for Alya. Her proper birthday present.’

She opens the jewellery box and Jemma gasps. Nestled inside is a delicate silver chain with a pendant shaped like a daisy. Its centre is made from a deep orange topaz and its petals from iridescent strips of mother-of-pearl.

‘I got it in London,’ Daisy explains as Jemma touches the stones, delicately, with her finger. ‘I know she’s a bit little for it just now, so I was hoping you’d keep it safe for her until she’s older.’

‘Of course I will.’ Jemma looks up at her. ‘You got me daisies once too, remember?’

Daisy laughs, brightening up at the memory. ‘I did! Hopefully this will do the same thing those did and always remind her that I love her.’

Jemma closes the jewellery box, her heart lightened. Daisy has given Alya such a beautiful gift that she is suddenly desperate to give her one back.

‘Would you like to know a secret?’

Daisy stops slouching. She nods, her eyes alight.

‘I love secrets. What have you got?’

Taking a deep breath, Jemma reaches into her pocket for the ultrasound picture. It is their latest, taken down from the fridge for Alya’s party. She hadn’t wanted it to get lost or for some nosing parent to blurt out the news over the cake, and hadn’t gotten around to pining it back. Now, she is glad she hadn’t because it means she can share it with Daisy.

Daisy gasps as she passes it over. ‘Oh my gosh, this is so cool! Look, here’s her head and all her tiny toes. I’m gonna kiss them all so bad once she’s here…’

She trails off suddenly, her finger following the curves on the photograph. Jemma watches her frown as her eyes flicker from the baby curled up on the left to its mirror image on the right. When she smiles, Jemma hopes it is because she has seen that the two are holding hands.

‘Seriously?’ Daisy’s voice is choked with wonder. When Jemma nods, she gives a low whistle. ‘Oh, wow. That’s a lot of toes that need kissing.’

Jemma laughs out loud. ‘Yes, it is. Twenty, if my maths is correct.’

Daisy sets the ultrasound photo carefully down and gets out of her chair. Coming up behind Jemma, she bends forward to hug her. Jemma closes her eyes as Daisy wraps her in her arms, enjoying the familiar tickle of her hair and smell of her perfume. There is nothing to be homesick about, because Daisy is right there.

She kisses Jemma’s cheek, a matching lipstick mark to Fitz’s.

‘Best. Secret. Ever.’

♥

The night air is heavy with heat and the songs of cicadas. Lying on a circular day bed with Alya on the end of the terrace, Jemma can feel the back of her neck prickle with sweat, even at this late stage of the evening. Glancing over at her sleeping daughter, she smiles. As she brushes Alya’s hair, still damp from swimming in the pool, out of her face, she wonders how on earth she is going to manoeuvre her back inside to bed.

Her answer, as always, is Fitz.

‘Let me take her,’ he whispers, approaching them on bare feet.

Bending over the cushions, he slips his arms around Alya’s sleeping body and lifts her away from Jemma’s side.

‘Don’t worry about brushing her teeth,’ she whispers back to him. ‘One night without won’t kill her.’

Fitz gives a mock gasp. ‘Who are you and what have you done with my wife?’

But he winks at her as he carries Alya away, her head lolling against his shoulder as they pass the turquoise-tiled pool and into the cool quiet of the villa. Smiling, Jemma turns her head back to stare up at the stars.

The holiday had been a complete surprise. She’d suspected nothing until the morning two weeks ago when Fitz had slipped the plane tickets beneath her cereal bowl. Laughing, she’d kissed him in the middle of the kitchen, spilling cornflakes all over the floor.

Alya had been delighted too, having heard all about summer holidays from her friends at school. She’d chattered about ice creams and beaches and inflatable toys all the way to the airport and then proceeded to sit wide-eyed in her seat, watching the ground recede behind her. The elderly couple sitting next to them on the plane had cooed at how calmly she’d taken the take-off and the woman had offered her a hard boiled candy to suck during landing. For once, Alya had decided to forgo telling her that she was quite used to travelling far above the earth. Much to her parents’ relief, she had simply popped the sweet into her mouth with a grin and stored it in her cheek like a hamster.

The villa Fitz picked out is perfect for them. Set high in the mountains with a view of the sea, its wide windows and white walls keep it cool in the heat of the day and the trees surrounding it provide shady spots for them to lounge in. There is a small town nearby with markets for fresh fruit and vegetables, and a handful of rustic trattorias that they have tried out for dinners, driving down in the hire car they’d picked up at the airport.

Italy is warmth and peace and something else that Jemma can’t quite put her finger on. It feels like a breath of fresh air, skipping a heartbeat with excitement. Wiggling her toes, a part of her she can no longer see her bump is that big now, Jemma thinks that perhaps this feeling is freedom.

She is drifting into that dreamy state, halfway between wakefulness and sleep, when Fitz comes back to her.

‘She’s in bed,’ he says, sliding into the spot Alya had so recently vacated beside her. ‘Fast asleep, although I left the baby monitor beside her, just in case. I’ve brought the receiver out here.’

Jemma nods, grateful that he’d thought about it. On their first night here, Alya had woken in the middle of the night and forgotten where she was. Her cries had been heart-wrenching and, as she’d held her close, Jemma had almost wanted to pack their bags and head home at first light. But come morning, the night’s events seemed to have passed from Alya’s mind and Fitz had convinced her to stay. Now, Jemma is so pleased that he had.

‘Have I told you recently,’ she mumbles, ‘how much I love you?’

She can see Fitz grin in the lamp-lit dark. ‘Not since yesterday.’

Reaching out, Jemma takes his hand. ‘I love you,’ she says, ‘so, so much.’

With a chuckle, Fitz kisses her fingers. ‘And I love you. I take it you’re enjoying your holiday, yeah?’

‘It’s perfect. Everything I never knew I wanted.’ Jemma catches his gaze and holds it. ‘Thank you.’

Fitz nods at her, his cheeks flushed pink. ‘You’re welcome.’ He reclines beside her, both of them staring out to the sea beyond. ‘And the pool here is definitely far more _adequate_ for floating in than our bathtub at home.’

‘Oh, so much so!’ Glancing over her shoulder, Jemma bites her lip at the sight of the shimmering, aquamarine water. Somehow it seems even more inviting in the dark. ‘I, um…don’t suppose you’d be up for another dip?’

‘With you?’ Fitz leans forward to brush his lips against hers. ‘Always.’

He is already in his trunks, so helps her tug her dress up and over her head to reveal her bikini underneath. Together, they make their way over the still-warm red tiles to the pool’s steps. As the water breaks over her stomach, Jemma breathes out. It is deliciously cool as it laps against her sides and she ducks down, wetting her chest and shoulders, before striking out in a breaststroke.

The pool is not particularly long, so after a couple of strokes she has to stop to tread water. Turning onto her back, Jemma spreads her fingers and enjoys the momentary feeling of being weightless.

She can hear Fitz swimming beside her, and, when his arm brushes against her own, she allows him to pull her through the water to hold her close. The feel of his bare skin against her own is almost as pleasurable as the water.

‘What were you and Alya talking about,’ he asks, ‘to send her so soundly to sleep?’

Jemma chuckles. ‘What do you think?’

She lifts her hand out of the pool and points it, dripping water, upwards.

Since their arrival, the stars in the sky have been Alya’s second greatest delight, behind only pizza margherita at the trattoria. Gazing up at them now, Jemma can understand why. Free of light pollution, the sky above rural Italy is so much clearer than the one in Scotland. Even without a telescope, she can pick out twice the constellations she can at home and in far more detail. Alya is transfixed by their familiar light and demands story after story as soon as they appear.

‘What’s your favourite thing about the stars, Alya?’ Jemma had whispered to her a few nights before, only moments before she’d slipped into sleep. Alya had heaved a heavy sigh and curled her fingers through her mother’s hair. ‘They shine,’ she’d whispered back, a paraphrase of a line from a new favourite movie. Jemma has been thinking about it for days.

Fitz frowns. ‘I hope you weren’t coming up with anything new,’ he warns. ‘I don’t think the book has the space for any more.’

‘No,’ Jemma assures him. ‘Nothing new. Just some old favourites.’

She has floated close enough to him to wrap her legs around his. Because they are floating, bobbing around in the deepest part of the pool, Fitz is able to hold her up, his arms barely reaching around her middle. Jemma doesn’t mind too much about this. They only have a few weeks more to wait.

‘Which ones?’

She points again, and this time Fitz follows her finger as it draws the constellation for him.

‘Ah.’ He nods, sagely. ‘The hero who was happy. The only one.’

‘Oh, I don’t know about that.’ Jemma leans forward as far as her belly will allow her and rests her forehead against his. ‘ _We’re_ happy, aren’t we?’

‘Are you calling me a hero, wife?’

‘You know that I am, husband.’

Fitz kisses her then, long and languid and full of feeling.

‘We are happy,’ he agrees, ‘and I promise you that I will spend the rest of my life making sure that we are always as happy as we are tonight.’

With a smile, Jemma reaches up to touch her fingers to his cheek. Next to their wedding vows, it is perhaps the best promise they have ever made.

‘Me too.’

Their lips meet again in the middle of a pool filled with reflected stars and it is a long time before either of them come up for air.


	5. autumn (again)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Over the past few months, Jemma has thought a lot about what it means to have a family.
> 
> For the longest time, it had meant nothing more or less to her than the heartbeat beside hers, both of them so in tune that they beat practically as one. Even on their darkest days, she had held onto this simple truth like a lifeline and had placed a gold band on Fitz’s finger as proof of it. She had received one of her own too, a matching half of a promise.
> 
> Then had come the idea of family being something bigger than both of them, a legacy and a burden at the same time. Jemma had been teased with the possibility of this long enough for her to mourn it when she thought it has been ripped away. Once it was finally realised, on a spaceship in a star system lightyears and another lifetime away, family started to mean something else entirely. It became everything, all at once.
> 
> This is what Jemma thinks about, in those last few minutes filled with gas, and air, and blinding pain, and Fitz’s hand in hers, before their family becomes something more than that all over again."

_“Time hates love, wants love poor, but love spins gold, gold, gold from straw.”_

**‘Hour’, by Carol Ann Duffy**

Over the past few months, Jemma has thought a lot about what it means to have a family.

For the longest time, it had meant nothing more or less to her than the heartbeat beside hers, both of them so in tune that they beat practically as one. Even on their darkest days, she had held onto this simple truth like a lifeline and had placed a gold band on Fitz’s finger as proof of it. She had received one of her own too, a matching half of a promise.

Then had come the idea of family being something bigger than both of them, a legacy and a burden at the same time. Jemma had been teased with the possibility of this long enough for her to mourn it when she thought it has been ripped away. Once it was finally realised, on a spaceship in a star system lightyears and another lifetime away, family started to mean something else entirely. It became everything, all at once.

This is what Jemma thinks about, in those last few minutes filled with gas, and air, and blinding pain, and Fitz’s hand in hers, before their family becomes something more than that all over again.

Percy is born first, Cassandra following a few minutes behind. The nurses wraps them in fluffy, white blankets and place them into their parents’ waiting arms. When Alya is brought to visit the next day, Fitz and Jemma lay her brother and sister on her lap, carefully supporting each of their heads. As Jemma watches her eldest daughter’s expression turn from bewilderment to awe to love, she feels like two missing pieces have fallen into place.

Five become one, just as easily as three had.

But Jemma also knows that family can be something other than blood ties, that it can be born out of something that runs deeper in their veins. And, when the proof copies of their book finally arrive, it is this branch of their family that she and Fitz are most desperate to share it with.

♥

‘The salads?’

‘On the table.’

‘The burgers?’

‘Cooking.’

‘The drinks?’

‘In everyone’s hands, and being topped up when necessary. The buns?’

‘Almost done.’

Fitz exhales slowly. ‘Wow. Okay. I’m going to bring it out now. Do you think we’re ready?’

Jemma looks up from the basket of bread buns she is slicing in two. Fitz is bouncing on the balls of his feet in front of her, his hands on his hips. There are deep purple shades under his eyes, courtesy of the four hours total of sleep they’d gotten between them. Despite this, he still manages to look excited. Jemma can feel the pulse of it, making her own heart skip a beat.

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘We’re ready.’

Fitz grins, and ducks forward to kiss her on the cheek. Then, he disappears into the house, promptly tripping over the cat and the double buggy in the hallway as he goes. Jemma rolls her eyes before picking up her basket of buns and carrying them out into the garden.

It is an unusually bright September day, which she is grateful for. Goodness knows what they’d have done if it was raining and they needed to squeeze their entire team into the cottage. As it is, the garden only just seems big enough to hold them all.

Jemma passes Mack and Coulson first, sprawling with Alya on a tartan picnic rug. They are both posing for her, striking superhero stances for her to copy into her new sketchbook with her new coloured pencils. Both had been gifts from the team earlier that day, since, Elena had explained as she’d been buried in swathes of wrapping paper, they hadn’t wanted her to feel left out because of all the presents for the babies. Alya’s tongue is sticking out as she draws. Jemma notices that she is using creative license to liven up their outfits. Mack is now sporting an orange spotted shirt, while Coulson has gained some pink and purple stripes.

Flint comes next, his visit being his first trip outside of the States. Someone has given him baby Percy to hold and he looks wildly out of his depth. Beside him, Daisy is in fits of laughter at his startled expression, and Elena has her phone up to film it all. Jemma is rather relieved to see May approach them and smoothly transfer Percy from Flint’s arms to her own, giving them all a stern look as she takes him away.

Cassie, on the other hand, is slumbering peacefully in the crook of Sousa’s elbow. He’d been in the middle of giving her a cuddle when Fitz had asked him to flip the burgers. Now, he has a spatula in one hand and Cassie in the other as he stands, whistling, at the barbeque. Jemma gets the feeling that if she gave him a brush and a pot of paint he’d happily start painting the fences too. She wonders if Daisy would consider loaning him out.

She sets down her basket of bread buns and approaches him.

‘Here,’ she says with a smile, ‘let me take her.’

Sousa gives Cassie up only a little reluctantly and Jemma carries her over to the twin travel cot set up next to the orangery. Following her lead, May brings a now-sleeping Percy over to join her.

Jemma lays Cassie into the cot, then takes Percy from May to lower him in beside her. Even in their sleep, the twins manage to find one another, their tiny fingertips stretching out to touch over the blankets. The hero who was happy and a girl who shines. They may not have been born in space, but Jemma knows that her children are the stuff of stars.

She hears a small snuffling noise and Alya’s head pops up between her and the cot, her pencils and models abandoned.

‘Are they going to sleep, Mama?’ she asks, her gaze trained on her baby brother and sister.

There is a lump in Jemma’s throat as she nods.

‘Yes, sweetie.’ She bends forward and whispers in Alya’s ear. ‘Do you think they’d like a story to fall asleep to?’

Alya’s eyes light up and she nods. Straightening up, Jemma leads her away from the cot and towards the chairs set up outside the orangery, just as Fitz emerges from the house with a large black book in his arms. He gives her a thumbs up and a nervous smile. Jemma can feel butterflies somersaulting in her stomach.

‘Hey, everybody!’ Daisy has tied Fitz’s ‘kiss the cook’ apron around Sousa’s middle and is draping her arms about his neck. ‘The chef says the burgers are ready!’

‘If you want to get yourselves some food and take it over to the orangery,’ Jemma directs, pressing two bread buns into Flint’s hands, ‘we have a surprise to share.’

‘More of a surprise than twins?’ May dead-pans.

Jemma chuckles. ‘I suppose you could consider it on-par.’

They have thrown the orangery doors wide open, so that the view to the lemon tree inside is unobstructed. Over the summer, it had produced its first lemon, its waxy surface mottled yellow and unblemished. The blossom is long over now, but Jemma likes to imagine that she can still smell it lingering in the brickwork. Besides, it makes her feel like Deke is still with them, even in the smallest way.

As her team take their seats, chattering about their food, and May lifts Alya onto her lap to help her manage her burger, Jemma makes her way over to Fitz. Smiling, she touches his shoulder.

‘Ready?’

He takes a long breath. ‘Yeah.’

‘Hey, you two,’ Mack calls out. ‘What’s this surprise?’

When Fitz gives her the nod, Jemma tells them.

‘The surprise,’ she says, ‘is that we’ve written a book. A children’s book.’

Beside her, Fitz holds it up for them all to see. Its large, black cover is embossed with bright and shining planets, and at the bottom is a picture of a telescope with a small blonde figure peering through it. It seems as if she is looking up at the title of the book, spelled out in sparkling stars across the cover. _Stars in our Skies_.

Jemma knows that inside the pages double, the constellations drawn twice every time. Even if it is a children’s book, there is no simplification. Fitz has drawn the position of the stars with pin-point accuracy, poring over the pages with the smallest of brushes to paint in the finest of details. Beside each picture he drew, she has written a story. On the left-hand side is the tale from a traditional myth. For these, she has chosen from varying cultures, from the Greek, to the Chinese, to the South African. On the right, Jemma has written their own stories. Alya’s bedtime tales, plucked from the skies around her, are set down on paper forever.

In the beginning, it had been a project purely for them. It was a way for them to work together the way they were used to, collaborating and sharing their skills and ideas to create something new. But slowly, Jemma has come to realise that it means something more than that. Their book is a love letter from them to their children. It is a way for them to share with Percy and Cassie the life they’d lived in the stars, each story a gift from Alya to her baby brother and sister. Their time in space will never be over because it will live on, in the hearts and minds of all the children who read their stories. And that feels like something very special indeed.

As Fitz opens the book, carefully turning the soft, glossy pages, Jemma can see in her mind’s eye how her children will come to read it together. She sees Alya with the book in her lap, reading aloud as the twins lean over the pages. She sees the freckles on Percy’s nose twitch as they reach his favourite part and Cassie’s eyes, blue as her father’s, widen with surprise at a story she knows back to front. It is just an image, nothing so certain as a prophecy, but it makes Jemma’s heart glow.

She sinks into her seat, smiling, as Fitz clears his throat.

‘We’re hoping it will be published in time for Christmas,’ he explains, ‘but our publisher sent us this in advance. Seeing as you all feature quite heavily in some of the stories, we wondered if you’d like to hear some of them now?’

‘I think,’ May says quietly, ‘we’d love that.’

On her knee, Alya has tucked her head beneath her chin. When she feels Jemma’s eyes on her, she flashes her a broad smile, making her lately missing tooth all the more visible. Behind her, the team that became their family sit, waiting with eager eyes for the story to begin.

Feeling an overwhelming surge of appreciation for them, Jemma turns her head and meets Fitz’s gaze. He smiles, the kind of smile that has only ever existed only for her. Jemma knows what story he is going to tell them. She doesn’t even have to look at the page because she knows it will be open on the constellations Leo and Virgo. What story could he begin with, if not the one that started it all?

Above their heads the sun comes out, just as Fitz starts to read.

‘Once upon a time, there was a boy and a girl…’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> eagle-eyed readers may have picked up on the clues in the last chapter as to the twins' names. percy is, of course, named for the constellation perseus, the only greek hero to get a happy ending in myth. it's also a nod to my boy, percy jackson! cassandra is also a character in greek mythology but she doesn't get a constellation, sadly. she could, however, see the future and one translation of her name means "to shine".
> 
> i loved writing this and it's really touched me how some of you have taken to my headcanons for fitzsimmons and alya's futures. i've been writing for fs since 2014 and it's been a major part of my life so in a way this felt a bit like a goodbye! i'd love to write for them again sometime though, so that door isn't completely closed. thank you all so much for your kudos and kind comments! they really mean a lot ❤️️


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